Whether you go to a large university with over 50 Greek organizations, its own zip code, a seven-story work-out facility, and 40,000 undergrads, or a tiny, private, religiously-affiliated school with class sizes of about 10-20 people and one single cafeteria... One thing will always be the same: there will be some sort of unique party culture.

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We are young, stressed, away from home, with raging hormones and a fiery desire to branch out, and have some tangible form of socialization that isn't the awkward eye contact and half smile you share with that girl you walk by every Thursday on your way to your first class... We refuse to settle for that. Look at all of the movies -- "Animal House," "The House Bunny," "How High" -- we are CONDITIONED and TAUGHT that you + college = parties, and we will damn well fulfill that prophecy, even if it means standing for hours in a ratchet house with sticky floors and Budweiser posters everywhere, talking to the lanky guy you sit next to in Composition 1 who totally stares at you all the time, slurring your words, with a red solo cup in hand.

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We thirst for human connection. Even in our most primal state, people would sniff each other out a bit, pick some bugs out of each others hair and decide if they were interested to continue exerting effort in continuing the interaction.

This is what we are doing at parties. I mean, obviously not exactly the same, but if you replace the bugs and sniffing with some pick-up lines, uncomfortably tight outfits, recreational substances, loud music, and LED lights, it's actually kind of funny how animalistic we are in party mode.

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We all know parties are a feeding ground for meeting, flirting, hooking-up, groping, grinding, etc. In our culture today, we occasionally become so fragile that we let parties become some sort of creepy fun-house alternate universe. We are conditioned to think that every person who we come across in a party setting just wants to get in our pants... and hey, that may be true! The lanky guy from Comp. 1 might have ulterior motives for discussing the use of onomatopoeia in the poem you read for homework on the dilapidated couch in the corner of a frat house.

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We are taught about those people who slip things in our drinks when we aren't looking. We are warned about people who will bring us to another room and take advantage of us. We are lectured about always staying with a friend, having our phone on at all times, and staying far away from the punch.

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I do not want to discredit how important this information is because it is always intelligent to be cautious in life, but I am writing this piece out of pure curiosity.

I am writing this article to spark a question ... Why are we constantly, actively, dehumanizing one another in a party setting? Why do we enjoy and practice crucial communication in such an altered state of life? Because as intimidating and harmful the lanky guy from Comp. 1 can be on Saturday night when he is inhibited by alcohol and begging you for your number, the funny thing is he is still a person.

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So Saturday night one may be turned into a scary monster who is up to no good, but at 10 am, Monday morning, when you place your spiral notebook on the table in Composition 1 and the awkward eye contact ensues, will he still be all that scary?

Probably not, right?

I am still learning and observing, because some people might still be all that scary...

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But my temporary conclusion is that we are a funny kind of people. A kind of people who like to put ourselves in the rarest of forms to meet one another in an environment where we are conditioned to expect the worst from each other, so that we may be able to uncover the best.