I tend to fall on the side of not throwing parties for myself, but I really don’t get the whole judging people as being selfish or arrogant for doing so. If the person is someone you don’t know: why bother judging when you don’t have complete information? And if it’s someone you do know and like, why not be happy for whatever it is they are celebrating? And if it someone you don’t, why do you need an extra reason to dislike them?
Heck, now that I think about it, I think hosting a party for yourself is a heck of a lot more honest. If you want to celebrate something, why should you sit around waiting on someone to do it for you? Or, as seems to be common, expecting and even trying to get someone to throw a party for you? Making sure everyone knows when your birthday is, making sure they know how much you are looking forward to a party.
You know, I think I may wind up throwing a party for myself one of these times, instead of moping about nothing happening on my birthday, maybe I should take responsibility and have fun just for myself.
I’d do it of course, but I suspect it is more a cultural than a personal thing.
I have read of Americans in Germany noting it as peculiar that people host their own birthday parties (That’s generally so for adults’ birthdays, also for other occasions to be celebrated e.g. I invited a few friends round on the occasion of getting my degree. If you don’t host the party/reception yourself it is assumed you don’t want one. There are a few exceptions like official retirement receptions and wedding receptions - I suppose divorce parties are also thrown (separately) by the people concerned)
I think birthday parties are really for the very young and very old and maybe for those with milestone birthdays.
However, I do agree it is a very acceptable thing to throw a party for your frieds and family because of something special or nice that happened to you. Share the joy, share the wealth, do it your way, no surprises. Think of the party as a gift you give your favorite people, rather than expectig gifts and a party from the crowd just because a certain date rolls around.
I would, if I liked parties. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with it. It’s not arrogant, unless you expect gifts or something. It’s just an excuse to party.
I’m quite surprised by this thread, I never knew it was uncommon to ‘throw’ yourself a party. I think this is a specifically American thing, or at least not common in Europe, because I really don’t know anyone who doesn’t throw their parties themselves (unless they are small kids, but even then they are the ones that decide what’s going to happen). Often it’s also expected that gifts will be bought, some people even include a giftlists (or link to one in case of e-mail) in theri invatations. You pobably wouldn’t be refused entrance if you show up empty handed, but you surely will be in the minority. This goes for birthdays, graduation parties, or any kind of party I can think of.
Hm, is this cultural? It may also be a difference in what constitutes a “party”. I’m late twenties, but I’ve some friends from 20-40, and we live in a university town, and many of us went to university there, so a party is almost always “invite everyone to your house, they bring a bottle and you provide food” or “invite everyone to a restaurant, everyone pays for themselves”. As we get older, the host provides a little bit more, but it’s still a long way from “host provides everything, people bring gifts”.
Occasionally someone may host or throw a party for someone else, but it’s almost always only parents of toddlers or parents of brides.
It’s like, every year, you get together with friends for birthday. So you invite them to your place. And they come (or not). Alternatively, you’d do… what? I occasionally feel pushy inviting people, but I’m sure they wouldn’t come if they didn’t want to, I think that’s just because I’m shy, not because it’s strange.
But apparently party means something else to many people: what does it mean?
I did when I was on Jeopardy! – a viewing party the first night of the run. It made sense – I was the only person who knew everyone who needed to be invited (family, old friends, new friends, coworkers, friend from tap class, next-door neighbors, … etc. …)
Simple; no one would come. Last party I threw, three out of 20 people invited (all of which said they would be there) showed up. I don’t throw parties any more.
Aw, honey! I feel you; it happened to me once, too. I had cleaned the whole house, bought assloads of liquor I could ill afford, and arranged all the music. Literally no one showed up, out of some 50 people invited. A few folks came by around 4 am after they got off work at the bar, and said, “So we missed it, huh? And you… cleaned up already?”
But I went on to throw many, many enormous and fabulous parties in the years thereafter (along with a few more that kind of sucked). You can do it!
PS. I should add that partying for a promotion could be odd. If it’s like “Woo, I passed my exams and now I’m certified!” that’s very good, and if it’s “Mwahahaha! Now I earn more than all your failure peons!” that could be gauche. I don’t know what the party mentioned in the original post was.
Not only would I throw a party for myself, I find it weird that you find it weird. I mean, I’d probably have some friends involved, if I was single and it was my birthday or whatever, but still.
I’m an author, and there have been several times in my career when I really wanted to celebrate a particular book coming out, so I’ve thrown a launch party for it. You might as well; the publisher hardly ever does it for you (though they’ll usually show up if invited, make a nice speech about how brilliant you are, and possibly throw a token sum at the party, if you make them feel guilty enough :p). I held two of these parties at a local bookstore after hours - we had nibbles and champagne, then a group of us went out to dinner afterwards. It was great.
If I did it all the time, or expected presents or something, I could see the issue, but otherwise…why not? Life’s too short. Let’s celebrate when we’ve got the chance!
I’m not talking “couldn’t afford a rental hall and gift bags” level when I mention it; I’m talking “can barely afford a wedding gift, let alone a shower gift and feeding a small amount of people” levels of can’t afford it. Most of my friends in the area are not well-off, and a lot of them couldn’t afford the gas $$ + finding an outfit expense of traveling to our wedding, which was about an hour away. I was low-key about the not caring about a bridal shower and had friends help me organize a bachelorette party bar/club crawl instead; those who could afford to come out for a couple of hours came out and discovered that bachelorette parties often get in free to clubs and get free drinks because it’s assumed that a lot of cash is going to be thrown at the establishments for celebratory drinks. Out of the large handful of friends I have in the area, a small handful showed up and had fun. Even if I hadn’t done that, it would not have been a big deal to me.
We’re currently planning a “hey, come try our newest homebrew experiment!” party, which we designated as a potluck type deal. If I end up with a job that takes me out of the area, I’ll definitely be throwing a going away party, if only to get rid of some of the leftover beer that we have from other parties. I don’t really see it as that big of a deal to host your own informal get-togethers.
I don’t call them parties, I call them celebrations. I let my friends know when it is my birthday and ask them “Do you want to hang out? Here’s what I have in mind.” I don’t find it to be self-congratulatory or anything. If anything else, it seems that I am honouring my guests because I am telling them “Your presence is important, please come!”
I also see such parties as a chance to get old friends to meet again, catch up with them and re-capture some fun we had when we aren’t loaded down by work and responsibilities.
True, it’s neat if someone else does it for me, but hey, got to take the initiative now and then!
So what about this: My husband and I are coming up on our 15th anniversary. I was thinking about having an anniversary party (I haven’t discussed this with him yet; it just occurred to me a few weeks ago). I was thinking that we have a lot of friends now whom we didn’t know when we got married, and if we’d known them then, we certainly would have invited them to our wedding. Unfortunately, some have died, some have moved far away, and some we don’t see much anymore, though we’re not on bad terms with anybody.
All of that is too much exposition, but it comes down to: Is it a good idea to have an anniversary party for ourselves and invite all our new friends as well as our original wedding guests? Or is it tacky? Just to say “Hey, we wanted you with us back then, and we’re still happy together so come celebrate with us!” Is it possible to do it so it’s not tacky?
I’ve never thrown a birthday party for any of my friends, and nobody has ever thrown one for me (as an adult). We’ve always said, “It’s my birthday and this is what I’m doing to celebrate! Come one come all! Let’s party!”
Last party I threw, three out of 20 people invited (all of which said they would be there) showed up. I don’t throw parties any more.