Narcissism, being obsessed with receiving recognition and gratification from ones looks, vanity and in an egotistical manner, is becoming a major problem in our digital age. This generation has a shallow approach of happiness. A highly liked profile picture or a sound selfie performance brings immense pleasure. This is among some bitter gifts of social media
The procedure is quite complex. People might take several selfies over and over again until they find the right one. Picking out details about their eyebrows, skin, smiles, teeth, hair and so forth, all in an attempt to find the perfect angle to make the perfect picture. Making it profile picture is another huge process.
No one is immune considering that if smart phones were ponds, a large portion of our population would have already drowned. Every human being is constantly drawn to the cheap narcissistic self satisfaction provided by the selfie making it an innate human behavior
Selfies sometimes cut a figure of a perpetually needy, anxious, depressed, and narcissistic person who constantly requires attention of others to fill in an emotional vacuum carved out by too much time spent exposed to social media. At times it plants a forced thought that might be the person suffering from one of many mental conditions, including Body Dimorphic Disorder .
The hope of reaching the greatest number of likes is a symptom that ‘selfies’ are causing problems,”? Seeing other people’s pictures, seeing the attention they are getting, we end up comparing ourselves and the fine details of our looks. Overtime, an obsession builds and our looks become increasingly more important to us. How far can the selfie obsession go? A British male teenager went to the extent of trying to commit suicide after he was unable to take what he felt was the perfect selfie. Well our Pakistani teenagers are not so emotionally fragile and they can bear the burden of un-cooperative selfies (God bless them).
I myself am chronologically ill with this disorder and my selfie loving part is constantly calling “it’s just a photo”. The only message lies here is that world at this time needs much more from us apart from some ducklings roaming around.
AYSHA BILAL,
Islamabad, December 14.