For those who have never found a cool stick and felt the impulse to show it off, there’s an Internet community of millions who want to see it. Stick Nation is a worldwide movement that thrives on descriptions of sticks and the people who rank them. A page posting videos of people and their sticks has nearly 3 million followers on Instagram, and on TikTok it’s known as StickTok. There are posts about sticks shaped like hands, ones that resemble snakes, slingshot sticks, curved canes, spiraled and twisted sticks, and beetle-gnawed sticks. The movement taps into something deeper than people just lightheartedly showing off their finds. The men who helped launch the cause are hoping to use it to get people off their phones, off their couches, and out into nature. It started with a single stick found on the side of a Utah trail in 2023. It was weathered and worn down, but had some excellent grain on it and a nice grip, said Boone Hogg and Logan Jugler (pictured above). They thought it would be funny to create a stick review Instagram page and post a video describing the stick and its properties. It was meant to be an inside joke with friends, but soon others found out about it and it took off from there. Then The New York Times wrote about the men, and their followers skyrocketed. Now, their community of “Stickheads” numbers in the millions and stretches across all seven continents. The pair field hundreds of stick videos a day, all while working full-time jobs. Jugler is a physician assistant and Hogg works in marketing. Every Internet movement has its arguments and Stick Nation is no different. A commenter from Antarctic complained that there are no sticks there, but he found an ice stick and wondered if that counts. Ultimately, the community decided to make a unique category: Antarctica stick. Hogg and Jugler also have a book coming out that will feature all the cool sticks you can……..well……..shake a stick at.
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| Antarctica Stick |
