Ip dip is a rhythmic rhyming game with many variations, the purpose of which is to select an individual from a group, for instance to choose the starting player of a game. It has been commonly used in British playgrounds for many years.
The speaker of the rhyme points to a different person in order as each stressed syllable is spoken; the person pointed to as the final syllable is spoken is thereby elected.
The aim is to delay and distract from counting the syllables or otherwise fixing the result; the rhyme should be so long that the (youthful) speaker loses count and cannot predict the chosen person. Perhaps this unpredictability is the reason that there are so many variations, including the practice of stringing variations together — which may be considered cheating.
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In the British sci-fi/comedy TV series Red Dwarf, the character Dave Lister uses a sci-fi inspired version to determine which version of the hologrammatic Arnold Rimmer should be deleted when the two cannot get along. The version of Rimmer who was determined to be deleted quipped "I've been Ippy Dippy'd to death!" This version is as follows: Ippy Dippy / My space shippy / On a course so true / Past Neptune and Pluto's moon / The one I choose is you
The British comedy troupe Monty Python's Flying Circus employs a version in the sketch "Ypres 1914", where the "Major" character attempts to count-out the platoon member who must choose suicide. It runs: "Dip, dip, dip / my little ship / sails on the ocean / you are it".