Scourge of the Selfie

Many most excellent things have happened in the last while when it comes to photography and the common woman.? There’s no doubt Instagram makes everything look pretty. There’s no doubt photo-sharing has never been easier. But there’s one major development, almost unique to Ireland, that is not at all good news. In fact it is an absolute, national embarrassment.

Sometime in the last few years, for some utterly inexplicable reason, it has become de rigueur for every girl over 12 and under 25 to experiment with pouting straight to camera like a Kardashian in heat. There’s an accepted protocol: stand in three quarter profile, one shoulder thrusting unnaturally backward, the hand beneath it resting on a protruding hip, toss your erect extensions back and finally, feign a look of shock at being captured thus (despite the fact that the person controlling the camera is absolutely aware when the picture’s going to be taken because they are taking it).

Now the affectation is so widespread, girls don’t know when or how to turn it off. It doesn’t matter if someone else is holding the camera any more, the selfie pose is the new automatic default setting, the modern ?cheese?. Just ask Miranda.

How did it become OK, let alone desirable, to look like the trashiest, most self-absorbed extra from a bad reality show or glamour modelling agency? (And why on earth did that particular look become the most sought after of a generation?) Very young teenagers who are only just stumbling upon their sexuality might be forgiven for dabbling in the genre (and even uploading stuff to facebook) but anyone else, anyone at all over 17, who does so ought to be ridiculed mercilessly until they cease and desist. It is not OK.? And it never will be.

Laura George says help stop the rot?@lgeorge353