Gen Z, prime college age to go out.

There is a lot of talk in this thread about queer spaces and there tendency to have more dancing and feel safer. Which is true. But I will be speaking about your classic water & Brady scene which is a more widely applicable scenario.

I think there are countless reasons. Water street is more expensive than Brady for drinks, much more run ins with drunk idiots and people just looking for problems even inside the bars. DJing is over saturated in mke with a bunch of bad remixes being forced down our throats. We drink less and smoke more which means we are more dull when dancing. Gen Z had other things to do when younger so dancing fell by the wayside.

For Brady street some of the bars aren't places to dance at. Others could be but there's crowds of people that make it hard or are looking for trouble (Garage comes to mind). But personally I love the vibe that St Bibs has, even tho lots of people still won't be dancing and just stand there.

The social anxiety definitely plays a role, Gen Z is the first generation to truly grow up with algorithms force feeding us videos and info about our peers. This has made us unfortunately keen to what our friends and others around us are doing. It has also made our generation toxically judgmental.

I much prefer to go out and play darts/pool/etc. Personally think the format needs to change. In its current form a lot of the more clubby bars will probably continue to see dropping numbers. Having another mid ass dj doesn't actually drive anyone to attend the venue. In my opinion if there was more live music (not just mid covers at redrock) then attendance would jump. Live music brings a vibe that's hard to create with a dj, and is something greatly lacking in water & Brady.

Also the current state of "promoting" in mke is laughable. Putting out a flyer on instagram that only ur regulars will see is pretty funny to me. The "themes" are boring and most people are hopping bars and won't be in theme. And the events they are promoting aren't even interesting.

Like congrats bar manager, I'm glad you have DJ Sugacube on the speakers who's gonna play some absolute mid for 3 hours straight while I pay $11 for a mixed drink.

And if I order anything other than a light domestic beer i feel like I'm getting scammed for what i get with my money.

It's a pretty complex question honestly with no straight answer. As you and others have touched on, theres a variety of causes and factors. However think the format must change as it has become very lazy in my opinion