The Milk Crate Challenge Is Another Powerful Argument for Single-Payer Healthcare
People this brave deserve covered hospital visits
I’ve only known about this new milk crate challenge thing since this morning, but the opinion I’m publishing on the subject is: People should not be doing this until we have single-payer healthcare.
This is not an unreasonable position to take. In fact, if you watch any videos of the challenge — which involves trying to ascend and descend a pyramid assembled from stacked milk crates that may tip over or collapse into each other at any unfortunate moment — you might arrive at the same conclusion yourself. Here are some examples of the trend, which of course took off on TikTok (where the hashtag #cratechallenge is now unsearchable because of the risk of injury):
And here are some videos from skateboarder Tyshawn Jones’ crate challenge party in the Lower East Side of Manhattan on Monday night, which reportedly drew a huge crowd and resulted in several tumbles:
As you can see from all of the above, there are many ways participating in the crate challenge can go wrong, injury-wise. You can land on a crate. You can land on your head. You can get a concussion. At best, you might escape with just your dignity a little bruised. At worst, you need to go to the hospital, mate.
Which brings me to the aforementioned opinion: Watching these Jackass-esque videos would be a lot funnier if everyone knew these participants would all end up okay, medically speaking, which would be a much easier assumption to make if everyone was guaranteed healthcare as a free (or at least affordable), universal public human right. Yet another argument in favor of Medicare for All! Until then, please take care of yourselves, crate challengers, and remember to practice safe falling to prevent further injury. Keep that chin and arms tucked and let your body roll.
Then again, some people have actually successfully completed the crate challenge without apparent harm, and a few have even done it with a certain amount of panache. Here is one such individual, hereby known as “White Mike”:
