It’s inescapable. Past every corner I turn. In every hallway I enter. There they are. A circle of a few boys, kicking around a small beanbag-like ball. I don’t remember the moment that hacky sack became the latest Gen Z cultural phenomenon, but soon passing periods meant impromptu games and my social media was flooded with videos of hacky sack circles, asking if it was only their school, or if the activity had taken over nationally. Despite the sense of community and active benefits that this phenomenon has brought on, I can’t help but develop my issues with the hacky sack epidemic.
Despite many teens playing the game during their free time and in clear, open spaces, some students have found the best playing times to be during class and the best locations to be busy parking lots and narrow hallways. As much as I laugh at the absurdity of the places these circles form, they very often are formed at the expense of someone’s parking spot or usual route to class. I may sound like the “fun police,” but there are acceptable times and places to play, and many students have found the exact opposite to be more appealing.
It may also feel as though hacky sacking appeared out of nowhere, its rapid spread may seem unexplainable, but I believe there are substantial reasons for the rapid spread of this epidemic. Like the famed “Labubus” and matcha craze of the summer of 2025, hacky sack may be remembered in a similar fashion. It is characteristically like a microtrend, described as a trend that grows and then dies rapidly, becoming irrelevant within a few months after first gaining popularity. Hacky sack is currently in its era of rapid growth in popularity, but naturally, with notoriety comes controversy. I believe that after rounds of online debates, settling on no clear answer for the rise of the trend, hacky sacks will most likely find their home in a wasteland of past microtrends.
Despite my issues with the hacky sack epidemic, I believe that there are many benefits to the trend. Our generation, feeling isolated by the social media age, needs the community that games like hacky sack provides. However, and maybe it’s the pessimist in me, I don’t believe that the trend will last longer than the next month. Soon, teenagers both at South and nationally, will collectively move on, deciding that the game is growing both boring and obnoxious. And their hacky sacks, along with the connections they made, will be forgotten to bottom drawers and the corners of bedroom closets.
