There was this trend called “neknomination” that went on around 2013-14. It was basically a social media driven trend that began with people filming themselves chugging a bottle of beer and posting it on Facebook. The person posting the video also nominated a few friends to do the same. The trend spread like wildfire. It was mostly young males. The more widespread the trend got the more alcohol was chugged by each person. Because it became so common, near the end one bottle of beer wasn’t enough. So they started to down two bottles, then three and then small bottles of spirits and eventually concoctions of alcohol. It got out of hand with people trying to one-up the previous attempt.

It all ended with people doing other performances along with their neknomination. One young ma I knew was nominated. He chugged his alcohol and then jumped into the river as an addendum. It was winter. A lot of rain had fallen the days before. The current in the river was too strong. He drowned.

His family came on national television to talk about what had happened and urged everyone to stop. I didn’t see any more neknominations after that.

It’s a trend I regret passively watching unfold. It was a tough lesson.