SwirlingFire: Selfie or Selfish

Selfie or Selfish

Quick glimpses into people’s lives are fascinating.  I find myself zooming in on the background to gain a peek into personalities.  All I gain from this is that I have a remarkably messy bedroom and many of you have storage solutions that would put Marie Kondo to shame!

Why do adults on Twitter social media do it? 

Here’s a few reasons I see:

• Self affirmation
• **Sexual Exhibitionist streak / unsolicited penis / vagina clit labia  photos **
• More followers / self promotion /business reasons
• Establish individuality 
• Finding our tribe
• Bragging rites
• Vanity / Narcissistic tendencies 

And finally; Attracting a lover – using Twitter as a dating App – this aspect of kinky Twitter never ceases to amaze me.  Dipping our toes into the convoluted clique packs and TwitFam circles to get our sexual, thrills / play partners. 

I always wonder about the Male d’s that do this.  Are they either extremely brave or monumentally thoughtless ?

Once the ‘relationship’ goes tits up (as it invariably does) then everyone gets to see our dirty laundry aired in public.  Fascinating human behaviour.  Nothing travels faster than a DM between female submissives when the rosy glow fades, withers and dies. 

On March 31, 2014, a story appeared on a website called the Adobo Chronicles that claimed that the American Psychiatric Association (APA) had classed “selfitis” as a new mental disorder. According to the author, the organization had defined selfitis as “the obsessive compulsive desire to take photos of one’s self and post them on social media as a way to make up for the lack of self-esteem and to fill a gap in intimacy.” The same article also claimed there three levels of the disorder—borderline (“taking photos of one’s self at least three times a day but not posting them on social media”), acute (“taking photos of one’s self at least three times a day and posting each of the photos on social media”), and chronic (“uncontrollable urge to take photos of one’s self round the clock and posting the photos on social media more than six times a day”). 

Excerpt from  obsessive-selfie-taking

Is this the proof that we all have a little bit of crazy in us ? 

I often wonder what drives us to show ourselves, whether our faces or close ups of body parts.  What are we really hoping to achieve from this behaviour ? 

Would we still post the volume of daily pics if we never garnered likes / comments / RT / wishlist gifts in lieu ?

I’ve (Swirly) not posted any interesting or graphic selfies as I’m clinging to my anonymity and non disclosed location.  I guess I could post photos if I wanted to. 

I think I read somewhere a phrase, if you don’t know what to post then photo your arse.  It made me smile as two years ago I was made to send at least two daily photos of my arse or more on request / instruction from my ‘ungentlemanly mentor and Svengali, my mindWizard.  What was once fun with my training turned into forced tasks that started my questioning of his actions, intentions etc., and the gradual loss of respect for someone I knew would never love me but thought did care for me and my safety as a fledgling submissive. 

There is a flip side to that statement of posting photos of your bottom, why feel forced to post a photo if you’re uncertain of what to photograph.  Isn’t it like speaking because you love the sound of your own voice ?  Flesh for flesh sake ?  It takes the sexy fun out of the process if you feel forced via peer pressure ?  All rather unnatural and coerced.

“….This behavior is associated with narcissism. A condition where you pursue too much gratification on your physical appearances and abilities…” – 

(Trendings.net, April 2019)

I expect one day I may just think, what the hell, and a strongly suppressed exhibitionist streak can finally be unwrapped and return.  I describe myself as a selective exhibitionist.  I’m also unwilling to share myself with people that judge mock and belittle me.

There’s also mindful apprehension in the back of my mind.  Once posted all control and ownership of the image is lost forever.  Who knows where it will end up.  Asking people not to reproduce or save your photos is ridiculously naive and foolhardy.  To then complain it’s used without your consent (unless watermarked with your account name) shouldn’t really be a surprise.  Not all,of us were raised the same to value other people’s image / property rights or boundaries. 

The desire to post pictures of ourselves, no matter how personal, is our choice.

Accepting responsibility for where our photos are used is quite often, out of our control.

When the image is used without your consent it is a tricky path to regain control / removal when used without our knowledge. 

The current trend of face aging apps, filters etc are totally exempt from our control.  The app owns all title to your image in perpetuity.

Many of us have no idea just how badly behaved the world can be when our images are worth valuable commercial data gathering.

If we continue to post selfies then we have to accept that the initial thrill of taking and posting them online is a momentary pleasure for ourselves and our followers. 

Anything that happens outside of that boundary, where our images finally end up, being seen by those we would prefer never did and, the future embarrassment to our real lives, careers and extended families are the risks we take to massage our egos.

Research resources :

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-truth-about-selfie-culture

https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/in-excess/201801/obsessive-selfie-taking

https://www.trendings.net/a/new-study-reveals-selfies-are-linked-to-mental-illness

For those of you that indulge in al fresco / scavenger hunt pics:

https://www.gorvins.com/news-media/allnews/innocent-selfie-get-trouble-law

Swirlingfire: A Posting History

@SwirlingFire 25 July 2019

Written for the #sb4mh prompt of “Validation”. Why not go check out other posts by clicking on the button.