selfies | Cryptic Philosopher

The selfie is one of those ubiquitous phenomena of the social media age that pretty much confirms whatever people already believe. It has given rise to countless thinkpieces about the narcissism of today’s youth, the rise of self-confidence in today’s youth, the assumption that posting a picture of oneself online implies consent to wider publication (or to receive unsolicited genitalia pics), and everything in between.

Aside from the fact that I think “duck face” needs to die a quick death, painless or not, I don’t care about selfies as a cultural phenomenon. I care that some people think the existence of selfies—or even just pictures posted online, period—is somehow an invitation to harassment, but that only happens after a picture appears online. If other people posting pictures of themselves causes you some form of grief, the problem ~~might not be~~ is not with the person posting the pictures.

Besides, if no one ever took selfies, there would not be as many pictures of extremely awesome Lara Croft cosplayers at Anime Boston (just to name one example).

None of this matters anymore, I posit, because of this woman, who posed for several selfies with a bald eagle: Continue reading →

By Alwaysthefearless (Own work) [CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Random example of a selfie. (Via Wikimedia Commons)

When I saw Mrs. Hall’s open letter to the teenage harlots who tempt her teenage sons, my only way to directly relate to the material was through my own experience as a teenage boy. I mostly recall it as a chaotic mixture of hormones and angst, but I feel very fortunate that I had people around me who taught me about self-control, as opposed to trying to impose restrictions on those around me. (Of course, I came of age in a pre-social-media era, so maybe things are significantly different now—I doubt it, though.)

I pondered writing my own response to Mrs. Hall’s letter, addressing my concern about how her overt slut-shaming is harmful to girls, or how her implicit denial of her sons’ moral agency in the presence of braless teen girl selfies is extremely harmful to boys and girls, or the remarkable irony in chastising girls about their own states of undress in the midst of muscle-beach photos of her own beefcakey brood. The only criticism Mrs. Hall seems to have heard and processed involves the beefcake angle, so she re-posted the same piece minus the teenage boy-flesh. I’d posit that the other issues are more important. Enough people have weighed in now that I doubt I can add much more, so here are excerpts from some of my favorite responses: Continue reading →

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