Day 28: The Selfie Tamasha

The selfie craze has moved beyond rational proportions! (Photo credit)

It was a pleasant saturday evening. The spouse and I were enjoying the sunset from the deck along with a cool glass of wine at the York Vineyards in Sula. But the experience was marred by something that was happening on the lawn in front of us. A bunch of college friends who were on a trip were constantly taking selfies on a phone. Sometimes using a selfie stick to cover the whole group. While the beautiful sun was setting behind them spreading crimson and orange across the sky, they were busy clicking selfies!! I wonder why they had to come all the way to the vineyards for that. They might as well have chosen their college lawn to make duck faces at the camera.

The front camera in phones is going to be the undoing of a generation. Clicking selfies is a craze beyond rational behaviour now. I can see people clicking selfies at restaurants while waiting for food etc. That's like a pastime till the food comes. "Can I have a selfie with you?" is such a common request for celebrities that I actually shy away from asking that. No matter what the occasion, whether alone or in a group, indoors or in open spaces, a selfie is in order. Click a selfie, post on all social media and then I don't know what's else is it worth.

Selfies are a part of popular culture we cannot ignore. There are different kinds of selfies depending on where someone is and what one is doing. Just add the word to the name or create a hashtag to make a new name. There are at least 15 kinds of selfies one can find. Since Instagram is the baap of photo networks, there are also selfie trends from time to time to keep the craze going. There was the fingermouthing selfie craze in July this year and the self five selfie trend in october.

It's fine as long as it's fun. But so crazy are people about capturing a unique selfie that might go viral online and get them fame, that they have somewhat lost their senses. They want selfies in front of running trains and from parapet walls of high bridges. India had the highest number of selfie related deaths in 2015. We all remember the recent incident of a man who got bit by a snake since he went too close to take a selfie. A college student slipped into a lake trying to take a selfie. 5 others who jumped to save her also lost their lives. This is a world wide trend and the internet is full of it - Wikipedia has a whole list of notable incidents.

The question to ask here is - where will this stupidity end? Is there a way to inject some sense into people? This is not about education since the smart phone toting generation is educated, modern and aware of what it is doing. Although selfies aren't officially cited as one of the causes people can die from, it is soon moving towards becoming one. And we need to really consider the consequences of giving into something as shallow as taking pictures of our own selfs!

When I look at people taking selfies I am reminded of this tweet by the celebrity blogger, Purba Ray:

If this selfie trend continues, evolution will ensure our future generations will be born with one arm longer than the other.

— Ray Stings (@Purba_Ray) July 28, 2016

And I think this is going to be a bigger tragedy since our future generations - if they survive deaths due to selfies - might be practically deformed! What more! Selfie addiction is also related mental disorders.

Look at it any which way, all this doesn't sound like good news to me. There has to be a way to overcome this and literally save lives. (Probably that could be a topic for another post)

What do you think about taking selfies? Do you take a lot of them?

This post is written for #NaBloPoMo which stands for National Blog Posting Month hosted by BlogHer every year.