As Unofficial, one of the more inclusive and collective events at the University, ends and everyone slinks back from late-night mistakes and hangovers, I’m left to wonder why such a holiday enthralls the campus, why some are already counting down the days until their leprechaun hats and Guinness shirts become relevant once more.

Unofficial intrigues — I think — for two reasons: the alcohol and the community. How we create that community in which we thrive has evolved, and the acts we partake in as a group have changed, but the desire for human connection remains as important as ever. Man is a social animal, and it remains as true today as when Aristotle spewed the phrase centuries ago.  

Unofficial brings in students from all over the Midwest, from Minnesota and Iowa to Michigan and Wisconsin. They come down from Chicago and up from Carbondale. But students don’t drink alone. They don’t confine themselves to their apartments and pour Budweiser or Baileys down their throats. They go out in droves. They envelop Green Street, the bars, the restaurants, the sidewalks. It is partially an ode to alcohol, an early celebration of St. Patrick’s Day, but primarily it’s a communal activity. Why?

Is it because it involves a “socially unacceptable” behavior? Halloween is about community as well, dressing up and occupying the town for a night of fear and fun. It’s also about mass consumption. Both of these holidays are social in a way that, say, Christmas or Thanksgiving aren’t.

Philosopher Adam Smith argued in his book “The Theory of Moral Sentiments” that our innately social nature produces virtue. We assign virtue to that which we see others doing, and doing en masse. It’s why we celebrate holidays like Unofficial and Halloween and Earth Day, and it’s why Festivus never really took off.

Important, too, is how our association with these various holidays and activities impacts our identities, not only individually but socially. The individual who stays at home and drinks to excess becomes an alcoholic. (Though that is a common joke, “It’s only alcoholism after you graduate.”) But even in college, the odd man out is the one who drinks alone. He may be more out of place than the individual who elects not to drink at all, but still goes out. Why?

It harkens back to Aristotle, who wrote in “Politics” that society existed before the individual and that those who cannot or will not act within society’s constraints are “either a beast or a god.” And since we can’t assign the lone drinker the position of god, we have to make him into a beast.

Unofficial seems to be an exceptionally happy time for campus as well. Students revel in their abilities to get up at 5:45 to start drinking, to miss class (or function while sporting a buzz) — but they revel in those abilities together. These things only bring us happiness when they get shared. The secret impresses no one. Why? 

James Fowler, professor of medical genetics at the University of California at San Diego, conducted a study in which he found that happiness spreads through three degrees of connection. “We found a statistical relationship not just between your happiness and your friends’ happiness,” he said, “but between your happiness and your friends’ friends’ friends’ happiness.” Put simply, happiness is contagious. 

Human beings have a need to be with others. Belonging to a specific community gives us a sense of identity, and our participation in a variety of groups comprises our individual identities. We’ve got more ways to be social now, new and multifaceted ways to interact not only with the person standing next to us, but also with the high school friend abroad in China. But those types of connections don’t diminish the need for physical interaction that a holiday like Unofficial provides. If anything, they strengthen our desire for those face-to-face interactions.

A 2011 article from Psychology Today explains, “Human beings are highly social creatures. Because of this we are intensely interested in what others are doing, and why.” And ultimately I think that’s why Unofficial brings the campus out. It allows us to see what others are doing, and it allows us to see if we are doing what others are doing. It allows us to measure ourselves in the eye of a collective society and to see if we can, at the very least, still stand up.

Sarah is a senior in LAS. She can be reached at [email protected].