Throwback Thursday – Unselfies

Walking in the park this morning, I came across three people (adults, yes) taking selfies of themselves in front of the lake.  When we traveled to Italy a while back, in Pisa people were taking selfies of in front of the tower.  All this focus on pictures of oneself seems to scream,” I am the center of the universe.”   But maybe that’s just my old-fashioned Inner Curmudgeon talking.  At any rate, here’s a repost of an alternative to selfies from 2014.

Every time I see people taking selfies (shiver … the term itself makes me throw up in my mouth), I wonder.  Are we in the midst of the most narcissistic period in human history?   Or does our assortment of mobile devices simply give everyman a means to manifest narcissism in more obvious ways?  Saturday night before the Diana Krall concert, people were taking selfies all over the Segerstrom Hall.  You’d expect that at a Bieber concert, but this was a mostly middle-aged and up jazz crowd.  And really, does anyone like the way they … and their spouse … partner … girlfriend … British Prime Minister (I’m talkin’ to you, president Obama) … look in a selfie, face distorted from the parallax of the camera lens?  Now, you might ask, haven’t you ever taken a selfie, Older Eyes?  Yes, I have:

See what I mean?  Parallax does awful things to a face.  That’s why I prefer Unselfies, smartphone pictures of beautiful or interesting things I notice during my day.  Like this one:

Isn’t that better?  So take the Unselfie Pledge with me … turn off your smartphone front-facing camera and swear off selfies.  The world will be a better place if you do.

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Tags: curmudgeonly rants, humor, photos, selfie, Throwback Thursday

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