I have heard of people doing this but have never been able to! My split ends pretty much stay at the bottom and if they get picked at, the end breaks off, so I deal with breakage when my hair has been bleached or too much heat styling. To prevent this, I just get frequent trims at the VERY bottom. Usually I can just do this myself and it looks the same after, but my hair just feels softer and doesn't get all tangled up.

Pretty much, if you leave split ends or pick at them, it will make your hair look overall a bit more stringy. I remember one girl who had very pretty shiny black hair... but her split ends made little white dots at the ends of her hair! It will also just make your hair get tangle more easily when it's dry and not healthy. If you pick at them, the damage will just go further up instead of staying at the bottom, where you can trim it off.

Hope this makes sense!