Horsemaning

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Part of a series on Photo Fads. [View Related Entries]

About

Horsemaning, sometimes spelled "horsemanning," is a photo fad that involves laying on one's back on a flat surface with the head hidden over the edge while another person hides behind the same object, only leaving the head exposed in the picture. Such photographs are meant to appear as if the person has been beheaded.

Origin

On August 8th, 2011, a Horsemaning post by Matt Stopera appeared on BuzzFeed^[7] that featured a sepia tone photograph called "the original" followed by a series of horsemaning photos created by various BuzzFeed staff members.

Spread

On August 9th, 2011, several articles were posted on various blogs including The Huffington Post,^[1] Spiegel Online,^[2] Metro UK,^[3] AD Netherlands,^[4] Blame it on the Voices,^[5] and CBS News.^[6] On August 12th, Horsemaning was featured on ABC's The Today Show With Kathie Lee and Hoda:

A Facebook^[8] fan page has accumulated 839 likes as of August 10th, 2011.

Controversy

Gawker writer Adrian Chen published an article titled "Death to the Internet Craze"^[9] that criticized calling Horsemaning an "internet craze" and pointed out that it was a creation by BuzzFeed on August 12th, 2011.

Horsemaning, the latest fake internet craze shows just how meaningless the idea has become. Three days ago Buzzfeed, the tireless meme-aggregator, decided to take a stab at creating a meme of its own. The site posted a vintage picture of two girls posing so it looked like one was the dismembered head of the other. They dubbed this "horsemaning," after the headless horseman, posted some examples and solicited reader photos.

BuzzFeed senior editor JP Moore responded with the post "Chenning: The New Horsemaning"^[10] with images of various BuzzFeed staff members posing with a cutout of Adrian Chen's head.

On August 17th, Rocketboom CEO Andrew Baron published a blog post titled "Horsemaning A Forced Meme? A day in the life of Meme Research"^[11] that criticized BuzzFeed for creating a forced meme. The same day, BuzzFeed Community Manager Jack Shepherd published a post titled "Horsemaning Backlash!"^[12] that linked to both Andrew Baron and Adrian Chen's Horsemaning posts.