Middle-aged, in the US. From my perspective, a lot of the change is due to overbooked children. My wife and I have a group of ~5 couples that we used to get together with regularly. Before any kids, it was ad-hoc, often out somewhere (dinner, bar, whatever). When the first couple had an infant, that changed to pot-lucks at their house (easy to put the kid down for the night). But now that 3 of the couples have kids, 2 of which are in middle-school, it's almost impossible to get the gang together - one of the kids always has some practice or another event. We still get tougher in smaller groups, but less frequently.
This is counter to when I was a kid - it was rare that I had a scheduled sports event on a Friday or Saturday evening. During the day, sure. But 6pm+ on Friday? Basically never. But that seems to be common now. Travel sports, so lots of weekends totally away, or specialized coaching at odd hours, or just a 3rd activity to pad that college application. It's crazy. I honestly have no idea how kids have any fun today (and I say that as somebody who played 2 varsity sports, one instrument, and was an Eagle Scout - but through middle school, I still had plenty of time for just hanging out - it was common to ride my bike for hours on a Sunday - into town, get an ice cream, across the river into DC, and back).
Overbooked children or just mathematical combination? If you have 5 friends each with 1 kid and the kid only does 2 things a week chances are you won’t ever get them all together.
Seems like these parents are prioritizing their kids and probably encouraging things they enjoy doing rather than wine night. Chances are the kids are enjoying life.
I'm sure it's a bit of both, but as I said, when I was a kid in this region, it was uncommon for any Friday night activities for the kids. Weeknights and weekend mornings/afternoons, absolutely. But we're not trying to get together on a random Tuesday.
Sports practice was almost always after school and we would walk/bike by ourselves even in elementary school. All nights were free except for scouting. My kids have practice until 8PM on multiple nights and not centralized where they could walk alone to get there.
In addition for me, when I grew up we had family around. Currently my closest family member is ~600 miles away so they can't pop in to watch the kids.
Where I grew up (and live now) - DC metro - those games are often Friday, but it's not that common for families without high school kids to attend. And by the time the kids are in high school (or even middle school), the parents just drop them and come home. But yeah, unsurprising that these are bigger social events south and mid-west.
I've been reading a 15 year study by a well known (here) sports psychologist. He studied why children played sports, and why they stopped.
The single biggest reason, by far - kids stop playing sports because of parents who come and watch. Turns out parents think winning is important, which robs all the fun out of it.
As a counter anecdote; in high school I played 2 or 3 sports per season. I enjoyed them all immensely, despite the teams being (usually) objectively terrible. No parents ever came to watch (outside the ones offering necessary transport). We'd occasionally go a whole season without winning a single game. No expectations. Just having fun with my mates...
I'm really thankful it was my time, not my parents time.
Unless it is a final or another very important match for my kid, I understand that this game is for him, an opportunity for him to socialize, to try flirting with his cruch, to enjoy being a silly teenager doing the fucking things teenagers do when not supervised, without me, the fucking helicopter parent, sucking all the life from him to satisfy my narcisistic need to be seen as an "involved parent".
Small kids, of course, are a completely different story. But once they go through puberty, parents need to understand that their role in their kids life needs to change a little bit and their kids fucking need their own space with their friends.
Some families have multiple children. Those kids are quite frequently of different ages, and thus will have entirely different activities (most high school football teams will not allow 5th graders to play, for example).
Those activities frequently overlap. No, Cub Scouts does not care that the high school basketball game overlaps with the camping trip because Cub Scouts are not in high school. Parents are (still) not able to be in two places at a time.
This means that at least some of the time, the older kid goes to their game without their parents. (Because the younger child frequently cannot.)
If you are able to solve this for those parents, you can be the first $1B single-employee company.
maybe because I don't live in a car-centric country, but I would just bike there myself with my friends, play, and bike home with my friends. From I was a kid until end of high school. Parents would often come to watch, but not always, and the fun was being with my friends anyways so it didn't matter.
I was in marching band (so I played at all the games). Is that not normal?
I guess it's just a generational thing, but my late Gen X mother was simply busy. Army drills twice a month will do that. I also concur with other responses that these were all social events anyway, so it's not like I was yearning for Mom to be there.
At a typical US high school, not very many of the students are actually playing. For most of them, it's mainly a social event, something to take a date to, or a time to hang out in the bleachers with peers.
Even if you have one child playing (or on the bench, or in the band, or cheerleading) and have come to watch, your other similar-age children will likely not be interested in sitting with you. They will want to sit with their friends, and rightfully so!
High school sports, yes Friday night is the standard time I think across the USA. Has been as long as I can remember, or at least as long as schools had outdoor lighting on the fields.
Wednesday was Peewee/little kid sports, Thursday evening was Jr High sports games, Friday evening was High School sports games, and Saturday was college sports games.
Same - my friends group had weekly (and sometimes more than-weekly) gatherings that all faded away when kids arrived. The group aligned more around kids and new friends met through kids activities.
This is counter to when I was a kid - it was rare that I had a scheduled sports event on a Friday or Saturday evening. During the day, sure. But 6pm+ on Friday? Basically never. But that seems to be common now. Travel sports, so lots of weekends totally away, or specialized coaching at odd hours, or just a 3rd activity to pad that college application. It's crazy. I honestly have no idea how kids have any fun today (and I say that as somebody who played 2 varsity sports, one instrument, and was an Eagle Scout - but through middle school, I still had plenty of time for just hanging out - it was common to ride my bike for hours on a Sunday - into town, get an ice cream, across the river into DC, and back).