Gangland Shootings part 4 - Read OP before posting - updated 30/12/23

Young people just aren't into it. The idea of anybody in their late teens/ 20s spending 4 days Thursday to Sunday in pubs clubs parties like everyone born from the late 60s to what maybe 1995 used to do is alien to them. You'd walk into any local where I am 20 years ago and there might be 200- 400 (depending which venue) people in there, of which half would be young folk pre drinking before hitting town or a few nearby suburban clubs.

I remarked that to a pal of mine when we were out about 2 months ago in one of those pubs, there was about 120 people in there and probably about 25 of them of clubbing age- and they probably weren't even heading onward to one.

In my mind

• stronger weed compared to the mild soapbar of yesteryear means many of them, particularly the lads, barely drink any more, they just stay in playing consoles with the lads or netflix with the bird. Even the guards on the recent series of Inside the K were commenting that its rare now they intercept gangs of young people carrying bags of cans to secluded parks and back alleys, it's all weed now
• today's generations taste for 1200 euro jackets and Yeezy runners means the money that was once spent on 4 day sessions now goes to Brown Thomas and JD Sport. The idea of an apprentice on 300 a week or a McDonalds or warehouse worker spending 3 weeks wages on a coat in 2004 was simply unheard of, that money was badly needed for drink drugs taxis and club admissions
• on the pubs, interest in the Premier League has definitely declined, and of the many still into it most have it on firestick- the days of Dublin pubs on a Sunday afternoon rammed full of young men in jerseys for various derbies on Sky are well and truly passed
• a fear of being caught in a photo posted on social media looking anything less than picture perfect- in my day you'd have a good laugh when you were tagged asleep, gee eyed, jaw swinging etc etc
• you met the lads for pints. Today they meet friends for dinner.
• in the 2000s you had one big music festival (Witness/ Oxegen), one minor one (EP), and a few dance festivals that floated in and out with non guaranteed regularity (Planet Love, Global Gathering, Homelands appeared once maybe twice). Today every summer has 40, 50 plus festivals- this is where most of the money that used to go to pubs and clubs all year is now going, plus how many of them fly to foreign festivals, something unheard of in my day when most of us didn't even have a card to book it with

Ireland had (for modern times) record births during the first decade of the 2000s- this generation are now in their teens and early 20s so technically the club and pub scene should be absolutely booming, but social media self consciousness, fitness, strong weed, fashion budgets and a few other things have killed it off almost overnight.

The strange thing is the scene seemed to boom during the recession, despite unemployment and emigration. You had Wright Venue, Sin, Powerscourt, District 8. Ironically as the country returned to higher employment and more money generally the kids born roughly post 1996 decided it was no longer for them.

its illegal to carry absolutely anything that could be used as a weapon without lawful purpose, if you’ve a lawful purpose to carry it you can. There is no concept of proactive self defence in Irish law so that isn’t a lawful reason. There are only very particular non-firearm weapons here that are illegal, because politicians watched too many king fu movies so throwing stars and knuckle dusters are out right banned along with cane swords and other ninja gear, I’m not joking. You can perfectly legally buy a sword and if you had a lawful purpose to do so, carry it concealed going down the street. If that sword was a machete it’d be downright illegal.