While couples celebrated their love on Feb. 14, some singles moped and cried about their lack of attachment. However, for the rest of the year, singles are free to celebrate one of the most coveted luxuries reserved mostly for bachelors and bachelorettes — hooking up.
What exactly does “hooking up” mean? In recent years, even our Yale-educated former president was unable to come up with a definition.
“Guys want (hand jobs) to count, because it raises the numerical value of their sexual conquests,” Wm. Steven Humphrey wrote in the Feb. 12 edition of The Portland Mercury.
When asked for his definition of a hookup, University graduate Chris Swartz said “sex.”
For others, the term was a little more difficult to define.
“(Hooking up is) anything more than kissing and when you’re not in a committed relationship,” freshman Ryan Sturges said.
For some, bars are a notorious spot to find a hookup. Swartz said sometimes he goes to bars with the explicit intention of hooking up.
“I don’t justify it,” he said. “I don’t care … It’s all about fun.”
Others said they feel differently about hook ups at bars.
“That’s a bad idea,” senior Jarod Courtney, a journalism major, said. “You should go out and chill with your friends.”
Spencer Miles said there is pressure for men to have random sexual encounters.
“I would say innately being a guy you feel that pressure,” he said.
He added that if there is increased pressure, it comes from being around so many male friends.
Freshman Dave Holzapfel shared similar sentiments.
“That pressure exists … it’s a social norm to hook up with people.”
Some, such as Sturges, choose to resist the pressure.
“I feel like if you’re known to be refusing hookups people would wonder what’s wrong with you, and it’s such a common topic of conversation … if you don’t do it it’s pretty noticeable.”
Some students said they prefer to live through television hookups instead.
“‘Sex and the City’ treats it like a game,” Sturges said. “It’s all the entertaining parts of hooking up without the emotional baggage.”