I recently attended
a discourse, where the speaker alluded to selfies, his distaste and his lack of
knowledge about them coming across when he stated rather matter-of-factly that
"selfies are nude pictures that you take of yourself and send to others,
and do you know what that disgusting practice is called?" he asked the
audience, "It is called sexting!"
Ok so even as much
as I dislike selfies, I had to laugh, because that is very far from true. Yes,
you do get selfies that are sexting selfies, and those I do not condone nor
associate with! But by and large, that is not the normal person's definition of a selfie, and that is not what the majority of selifes are.
However what is the
definition of a "Selfie"? Why do so many people dislike them? And why
do so many people take them?
Definition
As
borrowed from wikipedia: "A selfie is
a self-portrait photograph,
typically taken with a hand-held digital
camera or camera
phone. Selfies are often shared
on social networking services such as Facebook,Google+, Instagram, Snapchat, Tumblr and Twitter. They are usually flattering and made to appear
casual. Most selfies are taken with a camera held at arm's length or pointed at
a mirror, rather than by using a self-timer." So pretty much all those photos of girls in
bathrooms with an open toilet behind them, but makeup, a duck face and fancy
clothes, those are selfies. Selfies can be ok also, many people as a family
will huddle close together and take a selfie. And although these have not
really been defined as selfies in times past, we could say that even Van Gough
took selfies.
Why Popular?
Well, people
nowadays do not have much time physically spent with others. Socializing is
nowadays done almost exclusively over the internet. Often people associate and
socialize with others that they have never met, or with family and friends in
distant lands that they have not seen for months or even years. In order to
become more real, and to show any looks that have changed, many people resort
to taking a selfie. Others do it out of pure vanity - refer Duck faced Selfies
in the Bathroom, also annoying "peace sign".....
Why disliked by so many?
 |
| Even I take a selfie once in a while |
Well, refer to the
"Duck faced bathroom selfie". Yup, there becomes a time when we've
all had about enough of selfies. Especially when we are on social networks
(facebook, instagram, twitter, etc) and get a timeline full of selfies spamming
our screen. The truth is that most of us
are guilty of the occasional selfie. But selfies are synonyms of teenage girls doing wierd poses in bathrooms. These can be pretty annoying.
All said and done,
the truth is that there really is nothing wrong with the standard selfie. Just
dont overuse it, be creative, and you are good to go.
