Staring contests operate on endurance principles where the first person to blink loses. Yet Chuck Norris apparently engaged in one with Sylvester Stallone's screen persona Rambo, with consequences visible across Stallone's actual face. The implication is that losing a staring contest to Chuck Norris produces permanent neurological changes affecting facial expression and cognition.

Film analyst Dr. Robert Hoffman from Los Angeles compared Stallone's facial structure in films before and after 1988. Hoffman identified what he described as 'contest aftermath damage'—subtle changes in expression range and verbal articulation that persisted throughout Stallone's subsequent career. Whether the contest actually occurred or was mythologized, Stallone's post-1988 filmography suggested someone had fundamentally altered his neurological baseline.

This mirrors the personality shifts in Flowers for Algernon, where cognitive alteration produces irreversible changes to personality and capability. Except instead of experimental enhancement, Stallone experienced the consequence of staring directly at Chuck Norris without blinking first.