Redditor's gathered to discuss the absolute dumbest things they've ever done to get the upper hand on a an argument. To shut any debate down and deliver the ultimate persuasion, they opted for the pragmatic approach: do the thing they say you can't or won't.
Prepare for stupidity and 20/20 hindsight.
CherryCola32 asked, "What is the stupidest thing you've done just to show you could do it?"
Explosion on the Wrong End
"In grade school, maybe age 11 or 12, I had these cheap jeans. I figured out that I could flex my belly and pop the button open, found this funny and guy friends in class got a laugh too. One of them turns to a girl, hey girl checkout what OP can do."
"I flex my belly and let out a huge fart while the button popped open. She turned away, my buddy laughed, and i never did this trick again."
-- brother_meowzone
Biohazard
"A buddy bet I couldn't finish the spiciest chicken sandwich at this joint known for insanely spicy chicken in under 30 minutes. I knew I f***ed up when they gave me gloves to eat the sandwich so the sauce couldn't touch my skin and made me sign a waiver. Won the bet, but really I lost in the end."
-- mixedwithmonet
The Dunk of No Return
"In 2001, my sister got me a Sony phone, a tiny little thing with a flip down front. She worked in a phone shop and got discount. On the box, it said the phone was waterproof and there were tiny rubber seals in places."
"I believed them."
"At the pub where I worked, this aspect came up in conversation. Some guy said the phone couldn't be waterproof, and that shower proof was probably more accurate. Remembering the box, I argued the point . . . And dropped my phone into a pint of beer in an effort to prove it."
"I was wrong. Brutal but well-earned life lesson."
-- Queen-of-Beans
THWACK
"Cliff diving, saw a old man do a front flip off a 40 foot cliff. I said if he can do it, so can I. I did the flip alright, followed by a belly flop that Zeus could hear. Knocked the air out of me, but luckily people were floating near by to save my dumb a**." -- Skarface08
"I bruised my a** by jumping off a similar height rock and landing in a seated position" -- theknightmanager
Another Dunk, a Little Warmer
"When I was around 12, I was neglecting to flush my piss. Too busy playing armored core. So my dear mother brings me into the bathroom, and tells me if I don't flush next time, she's going to dip my hands in the piss. I looked at her, made a hammer fist, smashed it in the toilet, covered myself in piss, only a little on her(thank god.)"
"I wasn't even a malicious child, just salivated at the opportunity to show I could withstand the punishment and was thus unafraid."
-- sweetperdition
A Big Ol' Swig
"I was about 4 years old and my grandfather was making something with buttermilk. I saw it in his hand, and I cried and screamed and begged to have some. He kept saying 'No, you won't like it!' but I persisted. He finally poured me an entire glass."
"I took one swig and I'm sure he could see the disgust on my face, because he looked like he had won."
"I stared at him right in his eyeballs as I chugged the entire glass."
-- steffinator117
The Bait and Switch
"My partner was a heavy smoker, and at the time, I'd never touched a cigarette. I would subtly—and sometimes not-so-subtly, but always lovingly—urge her to quit. She told me I had no idea how hard it was. I decided to take up smoking for about a month and then quit just to show her I could do it."
"That was ten years ago. I'm on a pack a day. She no longer smokes."
-- UniversalPolymath
Reclaiming the Clock
"Parents put a curfew on the computer when I was ~12 during summer break. No gaming from 10pm-6am."
"A reasonable person would go to bed at 10-10:30 and wake up at 7 to play, right? 12 year old me just stood stayed up until 6am, woke up my parents, and played until noon. Then died until dinner."
"Rinse and repeat for a few days until my parents got sick of waking up at 6am. Then I went back to gaming until like 2am."
-- Hailene2092
Technically, You Did Do It
"Walked through the brush of our treeline to get a football to prove it wasn't poison ivy. I did it. I got the football."
"It was poison ivy." -- Hellboy32607
"I once did something similar, but it turns out I'm immune to poison ivy."
"The rest of my friends? Not so much." -- aetherwaves
Lingering Defeat After a Victory
"I stabbed my leg with a pencil in elementary school. I told people I couldn't really feel much pain (which, at the time, was true). There was a spot on my leg from the lead for years." -- movealongnowpeople
"Lol, I still have a piece of graphite in my left hand from getting stabbed with a pencil 33 years ago." -- Dyolf_Knip
Not How That Works
"I told my 6th grade friends I could just jump off a two story roof and not get hurt. Guess who only got a scraped knee that day? Not me. I broke my leg." -- DemiDork231
"There's always that kid in elementary that thinks he can fly." -- Obyson
Tase (Tease)
"Let a friend tase me in the butt for 1000 pesos (about 30 US cents lmao)" -- uhhvet
"When you get tased in the ass for 30 cents, you're doing it for the kink, not the money" -- __xor__
'My best friend's husband took my tazer and tazed me through my jeans and the material of the back pocket. The pain was something else. I also had a red mark on my booty for days."
"I will get him back one of these days. I am certian of that...'" -- fr332B3M3
Extraordinary Gut Health?
"Chugged way too much Apple cider vinegar.....huge mistake." -- dhensonjazz
"The implication that there's an appropriate amount of apple cider vinegar that one could chug is excellent." -- FoldupRabbit1
"I just got sympathetic heartburn from this." -- buff_history
Dumb, Horrifying Children
"As a kid I told my friends I could hold my breath for a long time, long enough to pass out, in fact. And that's exactly what I proceeded to do." -- hellbentforleisure
"My friends and used to have those breathing contests in the pool where you'd go underwater and see who could hold in their breath the longest. I'm a really competitive person so of course I won."
"I passed out in the pool when I was 9 doing this. The lifeguard was too busy flirting to care and he thought I was faking it." -- slightlylessright
Faster, Faster, FASTER!!
"Played that stupid f***ing 5 finger filet game with a compass back when I was in school. As I got more confidence I obviously got faster and inevitably the point went right into the side of my finger tip. F***ing idiot." -- Borodave88
"I played that stupid game at scout camp... I stopped after one of the younger scouts got to cocky because he could go faster than us older guys and sliced about 1/2 inch into the webbing between his fingers.. I can still see the blood." -- xdrakennx
All Claims to Iron Hands Died Then and There
"when i was 6 I stapled my fingers because i had convinced all of my friends that i had iron hands" -- ShelikeMykicks
"I was around that age too and I was fiddling around with a stapler and stapled my pointer fingers together. It was the skin just next to the nails so it barely hurt."
"I went downstairs to tell my mom who was doing laundry that I stapled my fingers together. I still remember the look on her face to this day." -- Frankfertt
The Feeding Approach of an Anaconda
"Won a doughnut eating contest. In 10 minutes I ate about 17 doughnuts, and seconds before the time was up and I had all my thoughts set on having a hearty cleansing puke a motherf***er who wasn't even taking part yelled that throwing up afterwards should disqualify you."
"Somebody counted that I took in a few days worth of calories. My appetite came back two days after."
-- _citizenzero
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