Pillow fight

A pillow fight is a common game mostly played by young children (but can also occur with teens and adults) in which they engage in mock physical conflict, utilizing pillows as weapons.

Many times pillow fights occur during children's sleepovers. Since pillows are soft, injuries rarely occur. The heft of a pillow can still knock a young person off balance, especially on a soft surface such as a bed, which is a common venue. A useful technique in a pillow fight is to bundle the nibs. In earlier eras, pillows would often break, shedding feathers throughout a room. Modern pillows tend to be stronger and are often filled with a solid block of artificial filling, so breakage occurs far less frequently.

On the evening of January 16, 1964, the photographer Harry Benson snapped a well-known picture of The Beatles having a pillow fight in their hotel room at the Hotel George V in Paris. Benson claims that the pillow fight was occasioned by "a cable announcing that 'I Want to Hold Your Hand' was number one on the American pop charts." [cite book|last=Benson|first=Harry|authorlink=Harry Benson|title=Once There Was a Way…: Photographs of The Beatles|year=2003|publisher=H.N. Abrams|location=New York|id=ISBN 0-8109-4643-2] Other sources, however, have the song not hitting number one until February 1, 1964. [ [http://web.archive.org/web/20040606163145/www.beatles.com/html/iwanttoholdyourhand/index.html "I WANT TO HOLD YOUR HAND"] ]

Rules of the Pillow Fights

Pillow fights are a game played to let out energy and rage in a mostly harmless way. In a pillow fight players can split up into teams or just fend for themselves. Then each player either starts off with a pillow or has to find the pillows hidden throughout the house. Then each player starts to attack the other player with the pillow, trying to avoid being smacked by a player in the head. They usually aim for the legs and stomach area. In this game there is no winner. The game ends when all the players are tired or the players just decide to surrender. This game takes more skill than one would think. Trying to attack their opponent while trying to defend themselves from the crashing blows of the opponents pillow. Overall the game is just senseless fun and is not played for a prize but for its entertainment value.

Organized pillow fights

On April 17, 2005 students from the University at Albany in Albany, New York set and currently holds the record for the world's largest pillow fight with 3,648 participants, observed by Guinness Records officials. [ [http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/content_pages/record.asp?recordid=58710 "The Guinness Book of World Records"] ( [http://web.archive.org/web/20060522135936/http://www.guinnessworldrecords.com/content_pages/record.asp?recordid=58710 archive] )] Only eleven days before, the city of Groningen, the Netherlands had set a then-world record with 2,997 people taking part. Other former record holders include Duke University and University of Warwick, and the Albany record is set to be exceeded itself once the official count for a pillow fight organised by the "What Now?" television programme in Invercargill, New Zealand is verified by Guinness.

Pillow fighting became part of flash mob culture with pillow fight flash mobs popping up in cities around the world.

It is also one of the match types among women wrestlers called Divas in World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE). Most often, this type of match is booked as a Lingerie Pillow Fight, in which the women "compete" in lingerie and little or no actual wrestling takes place.

In January 2007, Reuters reported that a Pillow Fight League was operating in bars in Toronto. [ [http://today.reuters.com/news/articlebusiness.aspx?type=media&storyid=nN16201934&from=business♦ No softies in Canada's campy Pillow Fight League] , Reuters, Jan 16 2007] Pre-selected female "fighters" with stage personalities are paid small amounts to stage regular, unscripted fights. The rules call for "no lewd behavior, and moves such as leg drops or submission holds are allowed as long as a pillow is used".

Students at Columbia University have incorporated a Spring Pillow Fight into the spring semester version of their bi-annual primal scream tradition. [ [http://www.wikicu.com/Spring_Pillow_Fight Columbia University's Spring Pillow Fight] ] Students run into the center of campus screaming and pillow fighting on midnight of the Sunday of finals week as a way to relieve stress.

"Pillow fight" in Japan

ee also

* Pillow fight flash mob

References

External links

* [http://www.pillow-fight.ch/ pillow-fight switzerland]
* [http://www.gopfl.com/ The Pillow Fight League]
* [http://lovegirls.co.uk/articlecomments/58/The+Pillow+Fight+League/ PFL Interview]