Fashionably Late? How About Fashionably Not Going At All?
It’s now officially cooler to stay in than go out.
It’s long been established that turning up to a party anywhere between 30–60 minutes late is incredibly fashionable. While the exact reasoning as to why this is has never been officially locked down, the implication of this lateness is that you were either doing something before that was a tad more exciting, or you are simply too cool to care about the strict start time imposed on an event. Lateness is so often seen as chic. But what about not going at all?
While there will always be a time and place for going out out, staying in appears to be the new in fashion way to spend evenings. That’s the prevailing sentiment on the internet, anyway. Mean Girls gifs and self care memes celebrate the joy of cancelled plans; neuroscience backed studies offer explanations for the growing relief we feel when someone ghosts you the morning of a planned outing; and advice columns impart tips for backing out of plans without losing your friends.
Staying in is the new going out. Especially if you ask the rising number of homebodies making themselves known on TikTok. This new clique, defined by their desire to stay in solitude, is mostly made up of people in their early twenties who are finding joy in, rather than fear of, missing out.
While FOMO has become a, so far, defining emotion of the current millennium, with the overwhelming fear dragging people out to parties and allowing companies to sell thousands of trending products, recent studies are finding that the feeling is waning. A 2023 study found that only 21% of people surveyed felt sad or disappointed at the thought of missing out on an event or occasion with friends — a shockingly low percentage.
Proudly taking FOMO’s place is, what Danish philosopher Svend Brinkmann calls, JOMO, or the Joy Of Missing Out. In his book of the same name, Brinkmann suggests to simply stop trying to do everything and instead do less — though he admits this is easier to say than actually do.
The fact of the matter is that everyone is exhausted trying to keep up appearances (both figuratively and literally). The endless pursuit to experience more often ends up a counterproductive venture, throwing you into exciting happenings that you can never appreciate as you search for the next thing to focus on.
In an interview with Vox, Brinkmann explained, “If we miss out on anything in this life, it’s seen as a kind of existential failure. You failed because you didn’t get to experience everything you could have experienced, or travel as much as you could have travelled, or had as many romantic partners as you could have had. So we have this whole mentality of always doing more that is built into our consumerist society, which, carried to an extreme, is really tragic because it’s not the recipe for a good life for most of us.”
So by doing less, according to Brikmann, “We gain the chance to engage in activities and experiences that are existentially deeper and more meaningful. If we live with the mentality of fearing that we [will] miss out, then we are constantly worried that something better might be waiting for us and we only need to move away from what we’re currently doing to have something better and something more.”
Much like the romanticise your life trend, that I recently wrote this piece on, Brinkmann recommends learning to find meaning in the mundane and routine. And whether or not these TikTok homebodies have read or even heard of Brinkmann’s work, they are all living out his suggestions; finding peace in solitude, shutting down the parts of themselves that feel envy at the Instagram stories boasting drunken antics, and focusing on what makes them feel joy at home.
While the homebody lifestyle promotes solitude, sharing at-home-antics and tips for introverted evenings has become a growing phenomenon on TikTok. At the time of writing, the hashtag #homebody boasts over 417 million views, with videos illustrating how young adults like to spend their days and evenings at home, by themselves. For the majority, the time is spent carrying out some essential self-loving; face masks, healthy cooking and reading by candlelight being staples for many.
While this homebody lifestyle has been brought to many people’s attention via TikTok, studies have been researching the phenomenon for the past few years. One 2018 paper, published in the journal Joule, found that Americans between the ages of 18 and 24 spend a whopping 70% more time at home than the rest of the US population. Another survey, conducted in the same year by the marketing research firm Mintel, found that 28% of millennials between 24 and 31 said that they preferred to drink at home because going out was too much effort, compared to just 15% of baby boomers who agreed with that statement.
In their 2020 report ‘No Place Like Home’, youth marketing experts YPulse observed that the majority of millennials preferred to go out to a café or stay in to watch Netflix at home rather than go out to a party on a Saturday night. A survey from earlier in the same year confirms that this sentiment was present even prior to the COVID lockdowns that enforced the homebody lifestyle, with 67% of 19–37 year olds telling YPulse that they would rather stay in on the weekends than go out.
This new found love of home could have many causes; the cost of living crisis and the increased interest in sobriety among young people (about which I wrote this piece) being just two obvious factors. But there are a few deeper possibilities that may explain the growing homebody trend.
The demographic of creators posting to the homebody hashtag are overwhelmingly in their twenties — a notoriously anxious time punctuated by fears of ‘finding yourself’, climbing the career ladder, and making and keeping a huge group of friends. The decade is also seen as the last of your youth, forcing you to see the world and not take life too seriously, while still setting up foundations for the years to come. The whole time is filled with pressure coming from all angles and perhaps that’s what the homebody trend is pushing back against.
There is a good argument for this trend being propelled by the ideas of seeking out comfort and shelter from the outside world and its pressures. When the trend was in its infancy, writing for the New York Times in 2016, Molly Young theorised that comfort is comforting because it’s a known entity, with people staying in to avoid the possible discomfort of an unknown outside venture. “Staying in, you’ll grow marginally; you’ll stay safe; your expectations will be met and never exceeded,” she explained. “Heading out to a party or an art opening is more of a gamble. Maybe you’ll have an amazing night you’ll always remember, but more likely you’ll just stand around awkwardly and blow $60 on cocktails.”
The link between the homebody trend and social media cannot go amiss. Research conducted by Joy Ventures in partnership with GetWizer, found that 20% of GenZers spend more than five hours every single day on TikTok. Similarly, Statista reported that Gen Z spent an average of three hours each day on social media. Morning Consult found 54% of GenZers said they spend at least four hours daily on social media, and 38% said they spend even more time than that. Despite the slightly varying results, it’s clear that GenZ are glued to their screens.
So is it any wonder they’re staying in more? Either they’re wasting their time, unknowingly favouring scrolling to leave the house, or they have so much free entertainment at home they don’t need to leave. To put it in perspective, Morning Consult found only 2% of GenZers do not spend any time on social networks. So while the homebody trend does promote many positives, is there a darker side to this supposedly cheerful indoorsiness?
In a piece for The Guardian published last year, David Batty, through the words of various therapists, theorised that GenZ’s overly cautious lifestyle could make them miss out on a wealth of life experience. Though the piece mainly focused on GenZ’s collectively growing interest in sobriety, the comments of psychotherapist Natalie Phillips highlight a worrying result of staying in the comfort zone.
The piece explained that while staying in can give people the illusion of more control over their lives, it can also lead to social anxiety and create a fear, rather than dislike, of going out. Phillips explained, “There’s a danger that your world becomes inward-looking, and that can then cause self-perpetuating anxiety. The outside world is much more scary because you haven’t got the experience to deal with that.”
But the easy argument against the worries of solitude is the age old adage; in moderation. Just as could be said for going out, as long as you’re staying in in moderation, and can realise when your solitude is verging on problematic, then the positives are listless (Again, I wrote this piece about the benefits of alone time). While — thanks to the ever churning, though often seasonally driven, trend cycle — there will always be a place for feral girl summers and night luxe after parties, for many, the satisfaction of being wrapped in fresh bed sheets by 10pm, well-oiled after a therapeutic self-care routine, is second to none.
There’s been a shift in capital. Where once the coolest person in the room was the one who knew about all the parties, heard all the gossip and was out every night until the morning sun rose, the coolest person is now the one who looks at all that and says ‘no thanks, I’m good on my own’ — well, according to the internet at least.
