A Loving Ode To The Group Chats That Got Me Through This Year

After a Trump presidency, a global pandemic, and whatever the hell is going on Facebook, the internet isn’t really a place I turn to for comfort these days.

But there is one pocket of the World Wide Web that’s so far remained pure, untainted by politics, anti-vax conspiracy theories, and Joe Rogen: group chats.

Back in the day, my group chats were largely defined by demographics – friends I went to uni with or colleagues categorised and sorted by workplace. These days, they’re a carefully curated ecosystem of interests, serving a specific (and sometimes niche) purpose.

Sure, many of my favourite groups are just different combinations of the same people because making friends as an adult is hard, but for the most part, they respect the purpose of the thread in which they’re participating at any given time.

That’s why, as we near the end of another year, I wanted to take a moment to shout out the group chats that got me through it. Go ahead and share yours in the comments, because I love nothing more than to see a group chat out here thriving.

The OG

My longest-running group chat doesn’t actually have a name, and that’s probably because it was formed before group names and pictures could be edited. It’s comprised of my closest friends from uni, as well as their best friends from high school.

Over the years, we’ve formed into one big friendship group that’s remained a constant for members who’ve started families, gone travelling, and moved away or overseas.

Most people have a version of this group. It’s kinda like a time capsule of our biggest life moments, with pictures of engagement rings and newborn babies shared alongside news of breakups, career wins, and disappointments.

Font Watch

This one falls into the “work friends” category, though many of us have said our farewells to the workplace that brought us together all those years ago. It’s named for a beloved colleague who sadly passed away last year, and sometimes we still share examples of the truly baffling font choices we see out in the world in their honour.

That being said, this group covers a lot of ground. It’s consulted on and solved everything from work drama to real estate battles, and that’s only when we’re not obsessively dissecting the meaning of Shiv Roy’s increasingly questionable sartorial choices.

It’s arguably also spawned more spin-off chats than any other. Among them is a group dedicated to Real Housewives. I’m not in this group, given I’ve never seen an episode, but that doesn’t mean I’m not mad about it.

Girls_only

Girls_only is a rare double spin-off group chat, the offspring of Font Watch and a one-time Slack channel of the same name, and it does pretty much what it says on the tin. Here, we share everything from discount codes for our online shopping exploits to honest accounts of our experiences with period undies.

You won’t find a group of people better placed to pivot from the scientific minutiae of retinoids to the intricacies of The Baby-Sitter’s Club universe.

Brunch Club

This is arguably my most self-serving group chat. It began when I recruited a handful of friends to dine with me at the cafés around my new apartment, under the guise of getting to know the neighbourhood better.

A couple of years later, we still meet for brunch when we can, and the arrangements are still every bit as chaotic as you’d imagine. Navigating the individual schedules, travel plans, dietary preferences and requirements of 10 people in a post-pandemic world is akin to herding cats, but we’ve yet to share a meal that wasn’t worth the hassle in the end.

Honourable mention: Thotpocalypse

This ominously named group started as a safe space for singletons to share our dating exploits and frustrations. The only rule? You couldn’t be coupled up.

This year, having “thotted myself into monogamy” – as the group would describe it – my participation has waned. I’ve elected to quietly maintain my membership for fear of being ousted, but I still check in on the chat from time to time to ensure everyone’s still enjoying themselves.

It’s a jungle out there, but the group chat feels like coming home.