PORT MOODY, BC — In hopes of drawing an upper-class crowd to her illicit house party, a student at SFU logged into her Facebook event and switched COVID-19’s status from “invited” to “going.”
“It’s really important that people know exactly who’s gonna be there,” Zella Fische, third year economics, explained about her soiree. “Because right now, it just doesn’t seem like they’re aware.”
Managing an effective guest list is critical for any Facebook event if you don’t want your party to be filled with losers, preps, and no-shows, Fische says, as most people — such as herself — frequently check the list of confirmed attendees for updates. She did not respond to questions about whether low attendance at her last three house parties might have had more to do with people frequently checking Dr. Bonnie Henry’s COVID-19 announcements for updates.
According to Fische, one of the biggest stresses of hosting an event, especially her latest one, has always been the need to put words in her friends’ mouths and lie about how close they all are. In the last two years, she has committed over 300 different people to events they’ve barely even heard of, such as “grade 8 reunion <3,” “going away bash!!!!!! EDIT: where is evry1” and, most recently, “2020.”
Fische brushed off questions about social distancing measures at her party, scheduled for July 31, claiming that the gulfs of emotional distance made by her friends waiting until the night before to RSVP and mostly disappoint her would be enough.
COVID-19 did not respond to requests for interviews by the publication deadline, nor was Fische able to stalk the virus’s location through Snap Maps to demand an honest answer. However, sources close to COVID-19 have affectionately called the pandemic as a “engaged citizen of the world” and fully expect an appearance.
Fische and her friends are not the first people to employ the invite-status change strategy. The United States of America’s international relations strategy has been founded on it for years, most recently seen with Congress’s latest attempt to switch Canada’s status to “going” for the “border reopening plan” event.
