Rites of passage

So I'm unable to understand this thing that has popped up since I've gotten married last year. Having said that, I've been married before which was a decade ago that very conveniently seems like a few lives ago but okay. Been there and I never spotted this trend so certainly it must be new.
What's with the necessity of hanging out with other couples? The urgency to make new friends who are only couples (as if my single self was too threatening for your consumption by way of the freedom I had and one you don't. By the way I'm still as "free" if that's even a thing if not free-er ) Or suddenly the existing friends pulling their spouses into the mix.
His friends might be (are) lovely, their wives might not be so. Similarly my friends might be great but honestly I can't imagine my husband hanging out with their husbands. Not only because most other men are douchebags and a bag of unresolved issues but there's absolutely no guarantee they'll get along.
My question being, why must we drag our spouses into the misery of hanging out with our friends and their spouses? And vice versa? Does marriage lately tend to erode our own self away with it or are we deemed unacceptable without our partner attached to our hip?
I promise you these stifling trends weren't around ten years ago or I would've spotted them.
This new age marriage rites of passage are a bit much for my frail nerves. Especially when I thought I've done this before, I might be rusty but I sure as hell know what goes where.
Nope.
I do not necessarily want to meet up with his friends' spouses unless I really like them and he doesn't need to go through the agony of sitting through the idiots my friends married. Because a lot of times even I don't kill myself that way.
I guess I just hate human contact. Let alone forced ones.
I just don't like people. F is a much nicer person.
I love my heater and my fleece hoodie. That's all
At least this month.