Slack Narcissus
Cate Blanchett is an intriguing actress – interesting-looking, androgynous, a touch of Garbo about her. She climbed higher in my estimation last week when expressing her exasperation at her peers indulging in endless selfies when attending a movie premiere. ‘Why would adults bother with that shit?’ she asked. Why, indeed? Okay, so actors aren’t exactly short on vanity; Richard Harris once said an actor at a social occasion will say something along the lines of ‘Oh, let’s not talk about me; what about you? What did you think of my new film?’ But this is something else. We’re talking mostly about adults over the age of 25 as well, not adolescents; surely old enough to know better? Apparently not. The new idiocy crosses all boundaries, including age.
I can feel quite evangelical about the antisocial tool that is the mobile phone; were I not so skilled in biting my lip, I suppose I could easily turn into a manic street preacher shouting my mouth off outside Sainsbury’s as an endless parade of pedestrians focused on their phones pass by, locked into a world manufactured by corporations specialising in social sedation. One expects it from teenagers, but the mesmerising effects of the mobile have infected more than one generation ahead of the twenty-first century boys and girls. I have several friends around my own age who cannot conduct a conversation without glances down at the object in their palm every twenty or thirty seconds; they don’t even seem to realise they’re doing it. I wonder how it would look to them if I were to be holding a book during a chat and continued to read it whilst chatting. They’d probably surmise I was pretty rude, and they’d be right. Why do different rules apply where mobiles are concerned?
The sight of zombified citizens seeing nothing of their surroundings as they stroll along the street, their eyes glued to a tiny screen presumably containing something so incredible that it warrants a collision with a lamppost, is so commonplace now that one would imagine the minority of us not enslaved would cease to be enraged by the image. Not so. The other day I passed a tree and heard what I thought was a bird squawking; I paused to look up and saw it was actually a squirrel. I’ve never heard these silent and stealthy rodents make a noise before and I was sufficiently captivated to interpret his vocals as a children’s story in which Mr Squirrel was calling to his lost babies. Okay, so it’s not as though I witnessed the eruption of a volcano or anything, but it was a brief moment of facsimile pastoral serenity in an urban jungle that being plugged into an iPod and staring down at a mobile would have denied me; and I’d rather have had that little moment, to be honest.
One more recent innovation in the hyper history of the mobile takes the biscuit when it comes to a yearning for the legalised punching of strangers, however, and that is the advent of the ‘selfie’ – the narcissistic need for the vain and insane to be constantly taking photos of themselves, as though they were their very own mug-shot division of the police force. They do it at home, they do it at school, they do it at ‘Uni’, they do it at work, they do it in their cars, they do it on public transport, they do it in the shower, they do it in the bath, they do it when they’re at a gig, they do it when having a meal, they do it when having a drink, they do it when having a shit, they do it when they encounter somebody famous, they do it when they visit a famous location – and all the while their attention is on not where they are or who they’re with, but me, me, me.
Imagine standing before the Taj Mahal or a Titian in the National Gallery and one’s first instinct is to turn away and hold up a phone to take a snapshot; imagine being in the audience at a live performance by someone one has waited twenty-odd years to see in the flesh and one’s first instinct is not to observe the event with one’s eyes so that the moment is seared on the memory until the final blink on the deathbed, but to view it through a tiny screen as though watching it on TV when you’re actually there. Hard to imagine being that moronic, but the evidence is there whenever we venture outdoors. The invention of the selfie-stick now enables a whole group of dickheads to indulge in communal narcissism; and to think at one time people used to worry that mobiles were pumping potentially lethal radiation into their heads. One wonders if they were right after all. The mobile is quite possibly the most effective weapon for turning the populace of the planet into unthinking (not to say voluntary) automatons ever invented.
Okay, so one expects amateur idiots to excel at amateur idiocy, but what of those in a position of authority, especially holders of high office? I still find it hard to believe David Cameron and Barack Obama could pose for a selfie at the funeral of as respected a world statesman as Nelson Mandela. Picture Harold Wilson, Charles de Gaulle and Lyndon Johnson doing likewise at Churchill’s funeral were the technology available to do so in 1965. No, I can’t either. Probably something to do with respect for the dignity of the occasion. And then there were the two Sussex policemen who took a selfie whilst standing next to the wreckage of the Shoreham Airshow Crash, one in which 11 people died. They at least have fallen on their swords after the error of their ways was pointed out to them; but what the hell were they thinking in the first place? Ah, thinking – they clearly weren’t doing that.
But these examples, as pathetic as they are, pale next to the fact that more people have died this year taking selfies than have been killed by sharks. The obsessive desire to document every action of the day, from the mundane to the contrived dramatic, has pushed several idiots over the edge – literally, in some cases. Amongst the fatalities that will no doubt one day feature in the ‘Stupid Deaths’ segment of ‘Horrible Histories’ are a pair of pals who died after pulling the pin from a grenade for a selfie, a student who pressed the wrong button when holding a loaded gun to his head for a selfie, a couple who fell off a cliff after crossing over a safety barrier for a selfie, the pilot of a light aircraft who killed himself and his passenger as he crashed the plane whilst distracted posing for a selfie, not to mention several involving moving trains and live wires – all of whose death certificates should read ‘Death by Selfie’. It seems life for many has been reduced to an X-rated episode of ‘You’ve Been Framed’.
One could be cynical and come to the conclusion that the selfie is merely the latest development in the ongoing process of natural selection, that man has given a helping hand to nature in separating the weak from the strong. The weakest are being disposed of by indoctrinating them with the belief they are so important that they have to constantly record their lives just in case something spectacular happens, and if it doesn’t, they’ll make something spectacular happen – and some will pay for that dubious craving with their lives. But let’s not be cynical, let’s…oh, sod it! Yes, let’s be cynical. Is the world a poorer place bereft of those who fatally indulged in selfie-harm? No, I don’t think so.
Petunia Winegum
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October 14, 2015 at 9:14 am -
saw it was actually a squirrel. I’ve never heard these silent and stealthy rodents make a noise beforesaw it was actually a squirrel. I’ve never heard these silent and stealthy rodents make a noise before
I like squirrels and seeing one when out on our daily walks tends to make my day. Sad I know but where we used to live I even started feeding some wild ones and got them to be quite tame with time. I especially like the EVIL GREY FOREIGN ones. Dunno why, i suppose they are simply ‘cute’…and a daily theological exercise-disproving Darwin daily (after a 100 years+ of there being cars on the roads and those cars being the number one predator, how can any creature not have evolved a better ‘defence’ technique than running back and forth to try and confuse the ton of metal hurtling towards it?).
Granddaughter 2 has already been nicknamed ‘Eichkatzl’ (‘Squirrel’).
Anyways , last winter I had the exact same experience as you describe, suddenly there was a squirrel screaming it’s displeasure like some demented turbo charged crow. First time I had ever witnessed it, didn’t even know they could ‘crow’. Since then it’s happened a few times. Maybe something has changed ? Changed across the country?
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October 14, 2015 at 9:20 am -
I got onto a busy bus the other day and ended up sitting next to a guy who was crooked over in his seat like a comma playing with his mobile phone. He was so engrossed (and making funny grunting noises – I think his breathing must have been affected by his scrunched up position) that he almost missed his stop and when he realised he had to get off he just bolted upright and barged past me practically knocking me off the seat. No “excuse me” or anything.
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October 14, 2015 at 3:42 pm -
Brave (or silly) man. In my neck of the woods (West Midlands) using one’s mobile on a bus would generally result in it rapidly being acquired by the feral youths who infest (seemingly) everywhere. This is far more likely if you have a higher end phone, of course. When I need to travel by bus, my phone stays in my pocket and it’s switched to silent.
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October 14, 2015 at 9:23 am -
Today’s post really strikes a chord with me. Every time I see some twat walking down the street with a phone glued to their ear I have an overwhelming desire to go and punch them. The pinnacle of irritation for me is the the wanker who feels it necessary to hold a phone conversation whilst standing in the check out queue at the supermarket, or whilst wandering around the aisles, and why do they always shout into the instrument. I often think they are talking to me, then I realise that they’ve got a phone pressed up against their lughole. On second thoughts maybe it’s the prick who ignores the posters requesting that mobiles be turned off in the doctor’s surgery and continues to phone all and sundry. What can be so fucking urgent that they could not wait until they were somewhere a little more private to prattle about their shallow lives? Smartphones for dumb asses!
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October 14, 2015 at 3:10 pm -
Smartphones for dumb asses!
Try living in Norfolk. Here it always used to be the rule that anyone talking to themselves walking down the street was simply a Care In The Community Case and could safely be ignored unless they actually had a weapon in their hands. Now everyone seems to have those earpiece handsfree thingies. I rejoice when I see someone has their cell stuck to their lughole, at least i know he isn’t talking about what bint he shagged last night or tractor voltages to ME even if he is directing his OUTSIDE voice towards me.
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October 14, 2015 at 9:26 am -
Basically I agree, but then I know I am a grumpy old curmudgeon.
Maybe you are turning into one?
Do you find yourself muttering about the “Youth of today, it was never like that when I was their age, you could have an evening out for 1/6d, we lived in a cardboard box, etc etc”?? Do you?
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October 14, 2015 at 9:27 am -
My iPhone 3gs – acquired at the end of June 2011 – died a couple of months ago. I do intend to replace it (honest I do), but the time without it has been cathartic. The feeling of being ‘out of contact’ when you go out, after 4 years of being shackled to social media wherever I may roam, of being free of calls of texts after nearly 18 years of digital mobiles… Wonderful.
http://retardedkingdom.blogspot.co.uk/2014/09/awareness.htmlNo Tinder, No Whatsapp, No Instagram. Bliss!
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October 14, 2015 at 10:45 am -
So, you locked a shackle on your ankle, added a chain, attached a few balls, but now feel happy that the shackle’s broken?
And you did all that by yourself?
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October 14, 2015 at 9:48 am -
I came, I read, and in my mind’s eye I conjured up an image of an Old Fogey, vying for his own particular form of Darwin Award, as he foamed at the mouth, ranting on about the iniquities of a changing world, as he conveyed his prejudices to his audience, many of whom would be reading his expectorations using the same technology about which he was virulently moaning, the irony seemingly escaping into the ether with his words
I shrugged my shoulders, made my comment, took a screen dumped image for posterity and the LULZ, and moved on…
Take a chill pill. As one of my kids told me 20 years ago, and he was just 5 at the time(!), “Things are different today, daddy”
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October 14, 2015 at 10:25 am -
Almost every morning I awake to one of these sent-from-cellphone emails:
http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b116/horta/jedentag_zpsvqk2adqm.png
Yep we get a picture of Granddaughter2 every morning .
(and yes he, ‘Youngest Dwarf’, can’t spell…not even his own daughter’s name!)
So you will never convince that our 24/7 connected cellular life is anything but a GOOD thing.
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October 14, 2015 at 10:36 am -
BD. A quick FWIW. You might find this tool….
…to be MUCH better for screengrabbing, especially in regard to your privacy
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October 14, 2015 at 10:41 am -
Thank you although I’m a bit Old Skool crtl+prnt scrn to be honest and using paint.net to edit out details in screenshots forces me to really LOOK (like actually put on my reading glasses). Probably still missed something though.
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October 14, 2015 at 10:48 am -
Sheessshhhhh, that sounds like hard work…. LOL
Worth taking 5 min to add the extension and learn how to use it, so you can do all that in 20 sec, though
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October 14, 2015 at 10:52 am -
I will indeed give it a try…got to stay up2date.
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October 14, 2015 at 10:38 am -
And on your main point, I chat on Facetime every day to mine. I wish my own folks could have done that in their day
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October 14, 2015 at 10:51 am -
And on your main point, I chat on Facetime every day to mine. I wish my own folks could have done that in their day
I used to get annoyed by PC World salesmen ‘ripping off’ (as I saw it) OAPS by selling them computers that had more chips than a kebab shop and enough computing power to run the North Korean ballastic missile program just so said Granny could check her emails. Then I realised that said Grannies were wanting to skype with their Grandkids in places as far away as Australia, New Zealand or even Sunderland.
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October 14, 2015 at 10:55 am -
Funnily enough the other day I watched someone taking a selfie and felt nostalgic for the days when strangers would politely approach me and ask if I’d mind taking their photo for them. I liked that random but pleasant experience.
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October 14, 2015 at 10:58 am -
Mr. Dwarf makes the point that without a mobile device he has somehow ‘lost’ his memories, when in fact he is missing the deeper problem. The drones wandering around staring at their screens simply don’t have any memories to retrieve.
An example; recently I sat on a bench outside a cathedral marveling at the sheer beauty of the building and the tranquility of my surroundings. My attention was drawn to the people, arriving via a side street, who would stop, raise their heads skywards, and gaze at the wonderful sight. Their kids on the other hand, would look up for a brief moment, before returning to their screens. One family went in through the west door, leaving their teenage daughter outside, sitting on the grass. In the 20 minutes they were away, she never looked up once. As they left she took the inevitable selfie to send off to her friends in order to show that she had ‘been there’. But she hadn’t. She had spent the whole time in cyberspace; reality never happened.-
October 14, 2015 at 11:01 am -
But she hadn’t. She had spent the whole time in cyberspace; reality never happened.
A very good and valid point.
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October 14, 2015 at 11:15 am -
You get a somewhat similar effect if you travel the world through a camera viewfinder.
Or is your name, ‘Snapper’, maybe misleading?
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October 14, 2015 at 11:24 am -
You are indeed correct Mr. Hum, but I make a point of differentiating between taking a snap and experiencing the situation fully.
I have given some thought to this and I think it is a crucial point. The younger generation (and I speak as the father of a teenage son) are so busy showing their friends how interesting their life is, and in turn upsetting themselves at their followers apparently even more exciting lives, that they no longer experience true reality.
I watched a couple rushing round Tintern Abbey photographing each sign board with a tablet, before exiting at a great rate of knots. They may as well have stayed at home and viewed the whole thing on YouTube! I spent two hours soaking up the atmosphere and trying to imagine what it must have been like living there hundreds of years ago. That memory will stay with me for a long time. Never once did I feel the desire to share this feeling with anyone, because a picture could not convey my emotions, nor did I wish to show the world what I was doing at that precise moment. I simply preferred to ‘be’.
The modern day survival guide says you can survive 30 days without food, 3 days without water, 3 minutes without oxygen, but only 3 seconds without a mobile phone signal.
Kinda sad really.-
October 14, 2015 at 12:03 pm -
That memory will stay with me for a long time.
I used to think that too. Infact I used to agree with Isherwood ” I am a camera with its shutter open, quite passive, recording, not thinking”. Now I would ‘kill’ to be able to close my eyes and ‘see’ in the kino of my mind.
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October 14, 2015 at 1:11 pm -
You may be being a little harsh on the Tintern folk. Recently I did just the same when being rushed round some extraordinarily beautiful buildings by our guide, a real Mr Ho. (Well, he might have been had we been able to elucidate his actual name)
The other half was able to gawk satisfactorily – we were there by reason of her personal interest and background – but being more interested in the history and their significance of purpose, I have to confess that, apart from a few properly framed shots for posterity, I flew round taking quick pics of all the English explanations to read properly at my leisure.
So maybe your couple had similarly limited opportunity and choice? Who knows?…. Just saying
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October 14, 2015 at 1:39 pm -
Tip for the annoyed …wear ear plugs…it might seem strange but if you cant hear it,, well does it exist!
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October 14, 2015 at 2:09 pm -
What saddens me the most is the mother or father who is pushing their child in a buggy. The child is facing away from the parent and the parent is speaking on a mobile phone. The hours of opportunity to engage with the child that are wasted forever is a tragedy. No chat, smile, sing-song, or pointing out to them the various sights along the road.
I was walking my dog along the pavement and a two year old in a buggy started saying “Mummy…doggie…mummy…doggie”. The “mummy” said “Sshh…”
It was sad.
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October 14, 2015 at 3:01 pm -
The child is facing away from the parent
That is just cruel….how will the child get to share the enjoyment of Mama’s cigarette?!?! Granddaughther2 (4 months) just loves watching the blue smoke from Opa’s ciggy curl and twist when I’m pushing her around the parish, amuses her for hours AND I seem to recall reading that ‘studies’ show that children who grow up in NONSMOKING environments invariably turn out to be mean spirited, puritanical, waspswallowing, lemon sucking fASHist ASTHMA sufferers. Bad enough Granddaughter is a cruelly deformed Ginger Day-Walker but to give her such a massive social handicap on top of her mutated genes?!
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October 14, 2015 at 4:54 pm -
I see that so often and it sets my teeth on edge. If you feel that way why not sell the infant and get some really good kit with the money
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October 14, 2015 at 3:51 pm -
If you think the grey ones are cute, Dwarf, it is perhaps because you haven’t seen the rare native squirrel. For that, maybe the Isle of Wight or the remote trees at the Shap Wells Hotelin the moors on the edge of the Lake District.
My ginger cat and his chum (also ginger) from across the way managed to hunt down a grey in a tree, surely where the squirrel should have been in its element, which is a victory of a sort for gingers everywhere. On the other hand, the athletic little blighter leaps into the air to catch birds and bats …
A busybody in the Council rejected my Planning Application for an extension on the grounds that we might have bats in our loft. I pointed out the cat’s abilities, and that after he’d been in the loft there certainly wouldn’t be any left whether or not there had been any to start with. Oddly enough, it passed the second time through …
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October 14, 2015 at 4:20 pm -
If you think the grey ones are cute, Dwarf, it is perhaps because you haven’t seen the rare native squirrel.
Fortunately i can still remember them from my childhood, nasty sneaky gingery things…with none of the noble elegance, intelligence nor cutes of the Grey. Personally though I’m holding out for the Asian Black ones that are supposed to be INVADING our shores.
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