People Fell Down... So I Laughed at Them.

Spoiler Alert:  If you are in more of a mood to see people fall down than you are to read, just skip ahead and click the first video link and the last two video links in this post.  I promise you they’re worth the click.  For those of you who haven’t completely given way to the intellectual laziness and attention atrophy promoted by hyperlinks, continue reading this highly unintellectual and relatively short post dedicated to adults who act like children. #childlikestupidity

This is a video of a friend of mine attempting to jump and hang from a tree branch.  She fell down... so I laughed at her.  

Why do we laugh every time someone falls down?  The life span of the show America’s Funniest Home Videos is proof that we are completely entertained by watching our fellow human beings take a good tumble.  Here are a few examples right off the AFV Youtube channel

Treadmill Falls.  I laughed so hard while watching this I may or may not have peed a little.  Then I watched it again.

#exercisekills

Skateboard Falls.  Serves them right… rebels! 

Skater punks have it coming…

And finally, a montage of swing related falls.

Well, this blog isn’t afraid to join the likes of AFV (and by extension post-Full-House-era Bob Saget) and capitalize on our extremely unempathetic desire to laugh when otherwise able-bodied people unintentionally leave their feet.

What happens when this strange desire and the inability to resist a dare collide?   The answer is obvious… Someone will fall down and everyone watching will laugh at him.

While camping a couple of weekends ago with a group of fans of this blog, I was privileged to witness some truly comical behavior as people fully embraced the culture of ‘daring.’  Over the course of the weekend several dares had been thrown down and attempted to various degrees of success.  In full disclosure, I will admit that these fans are my cousins, and as such they are all genetically obligated to be fans of this blog.  After I finish telling you about their ‘playground zipline dare’ I will let you decide if I should be proud or mortified that I share DNA with these guys. 

THE ZIPLINE DARE

Terms of the Dare (if you would rather skip this video, go ahead. There’s a summary below.  This video isn't super exciting but you do get introduced to the participants.): 

Video Summary:  One grown man is going to push another grown man as hard as he can on the zipline (approximately 2/3 of the way).  If the ‘pushee’ can hang on to the zipline handle when it hits the end of the line and abruptly jerks after stopping, the pushee has successfully completed the dare. 

Many things about this dare seemed sketchy:

·      A group of grown men completely take over the most popular piece of equipment on a playground designed for small children.

·      This dare could have been more dangerous than the guys thought.

·      The guys kept upping the stakes of the dare until they achieved failure.

·      They kept going after they achieved failure.

In spite of the sketchy nature of this dare and the risk of injury, I couldn’t resist the urge to pull out my phone when they told me what they were doing.  I recorded the outcome of their dare in a series of videos for all of you to see. 

Tony’s First Attempt:

Boring!  As you can see, Tony easily survives the first attempt.  Giving in to their need to see someone fall, the guys renegotiate the terms of the dare and determine that two grown men should push so that greater momentum is placed on the pushee.  Please note that the pushee changes in this next video.  After watching Tony succeed, Ken decided he wanted in on the dare.  I’m not sure that Ken realized they had renegotiated the terms of the dare when he signed on for this.  I don’t think the guys cared. 

Ken’s Attempt:

Ken totally knocked the wind out of himself, but he was fine in the long run.  We all laughed longer than it took him to start breathing normally again.  #humaninstinctismean

Tony decided that he wanted to try again despite the fact that he just watched Ken take a hard fall.  Why?  I have no idea.  I wouldn’t sign up for that!

Tony’s Second Attempt.  Sorry the video is dark.  Turn up your screen brightness for this one.  Before starting this dare the guys actually waited until the park was cleared so they wouldn’t show kids (other their own… they are all fathers) how to be dangerous on the playground.  We were losing light quickly at this point.

A very athletic 'dismount'!

My assessment of this dare:  I wouldn’t do it, but then again my doctor told me to stop hitting my head.  Apparently a 4th concussion really puts a doctor on edge.  Who knew? 

Funny Factor: 3/5

Creativity: 2.5/5

Family Bonding: 5/5

Danger: 4/5

Send me videos of your dares (naty.severson [at] gmail.com)!  I might just share them on this blog!  As a warning, I won’t encourage danger, so anything more dangerous than this won’t be considered for this blog!