While bars and nightclubs are best known for their noisy, crowded, and alcoholic atmosphere, a Vancouver clinical advisor says nightlife is also an important part of development for many young people who have been without it for months due to COVID-19.
Returning to the bars and clubs after months of incarceration is beneficial for young people whose social interactions have been disrupted at a time in their lives when it is important to develop friendships and independence, adviser Nina Sheere told nightclubs on Friday on CBCsclub The early edition.
On July 1, BC health officials gave the go-ahead to reopen bars, clubs and casinos and return to normal liquor hours as the province skipped into step 3 of a four-step reopening plan. Socializing between tables and dancing is not yet allowed, but the nightclubs are now open to the public and people can sip cocktails in the clubs again.
“[Nightlife is] really representative of the transition period in life when you grow up, “said Sheere.
In Western culture in particular, clubbing is seen as a sign of the next chapter in life, she said.
“What is going on in terms of development policy is that friends are becoming more and more important and playing a bigger role, while family ties are loosening a little. And that is normal and should happen,” said Sheere.
She said nightlife can play an important role for this demographic as they typically drop out of high school and move towards adult independence.
Tanysha Klassen, former chairwoman of the BC Federation of Students, says she wasn’t a big nightclub goer before the pandemic but noted that she missed the scene very much last year.
She said even for people who don’t dance, a semblance of normalcy is welcomed by their peers – many of them worked on the front lines and missed rites of passage like graduation ceremonies or their first legal drink.
Missed and weeded
Classes said not only had her colleagues missed it, many were upset about being selected by Prime Minister John Horgan, who earlier this spring urged young people “not to blow this for the rest of us” while he turned up related to the spread of the virus.
“Young people were the people who were expected to still work. They didn’t have the luxury of working from home. They had to go in and be in restaurants or grocery stores near their peers and all. So they did just trying to do their job, “Klassen said.
She said some young people tried to prove Horgan otherwise, which further cut her off from social contact.
“We’re really trying to overcompensate for what then made pandemic isolation and all that much worse,” she said.
Sheere says that many of her young clients have been living with their families longer than planned and have not been able to realize their plans and dreams.
“Not being able to go out and connect with their peers, even in their local communities, was just something like the last drop that was really, really difficult for many of them,” she said.
6:29Celebrate after the pandemic
Nightclubs are reopening in BC after months of closure due to COVID-19. Nina Sheere, Registered Clinical Advisor, and Tanysha Klassen, former Chair of the BC Federation of Students, discuss the benefits of nightlife for young people. 6:29