GMHS Lasso Online

For any of you that have seen this fad in action, I would imagine that your first reaction was just as confused as mine. It is a strange and seemingly pointless activity which many of you know as “planking.” While it has other names-- “the lying down game” (England), “playing dead” (Korea), “facedowns” (Ireland), and “on one’s belly” (France)-- most of us were introduced to the fad as “planking.” Some were first exposed to it while looking at pictures on Facebook, some were told by a friend, and some even had the chance of seeing it firsthand.

When sophomore Paul Sanders came across a picture of somebody planking on Facebook for his first time he “thought they took the picture standing and just needed to rotate it.”

The rules are that the person must be lying flat on their stomach with their arms at their sides, while pointing their fingers and toes directly behind them. Next, a picture must be taken to document the plank. This is what makes the activity bigger than just someone lying down in public. The point is to find the coolest or most original place to plank, and to get a good picture while doing it.

It’s hard to think how such a seemingly pointless game could have become so world-renown, in what appeared to be a short period of time. In actuality, this “lying down game” originated roughly in the year 2000 with Christian Langdon and Gary Clarkson in England. As early teenagers, the two would have fun going to public places and taking turns lying down in random areas while the other would stand from afar and laugh at the people’s reactions. Eventually the game caught on to their friends and around their school, and people began posting pictures of themselves planking on social networking sites like Facebook and Myspace.  Its popularity skyrocketed when the two made a group for the game on Facebook in 2007.

 Since that time it has become a worldwide fad. Cases began springing up everywhere, and more accounts of accidents that occurred while planking arose in the news. Seven doctors and nurses were suspended from duty at the hospital they worked at, after being caught planking at work. There have even been incidents of those who attempt a particularly dangerous plank, and end up losing their lives.

So while you may not get it or enjoy it, it’s amazing how an activity so simple and seemingly meaningless grew into a game that has caused everything from hilarity to fatality.

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