Selfies are a huge phenomenon. People often take pictures of themselves and post them on social media for their friends or even the whole word to see. The question is: why do we take selfies, and are they that big of a deal?

Are you guilty of taking a selfie?

• Yes
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When looking particularly good on a certain day (or maybe everyday), both boys and girls tend to want to take a picture of themselves so that they can remember it later or post it on social media. This is done regularly by mostly teenagers and young adults, but anyone can take a selfie. It’s just a picture of one’s self, and whether they want to keep it private or share it with other people is their choice.

The song #SELFIE by the Chainsmokers is one aspect that made selfies themselves such a big deal; although the song just came out in January 2014, so it’s fairly recent. Basically everyone knows this song, I believe its notoriety is one reason why people find selfies such an annoying concept, even though the song is justifiably making fun of the trending term and the artists were merely having fun. The line “But first, let me take a selfie” has been used in many internet memes, and the song itself has been made into countless parodies. Clearly this song is simply poking fun at the selfie concept, and shouldn’t be taken seriously.

Even though the word is an amusing term of taking a picture of oneself, selfies have been made into something bigger, even expanding into something called the Seflie Olympics, which debuted in early 2014. This consisted of people trying to upstage others in their selfie game, taking better selfies than everyone else and going to drastic measures to do so. A lot of people really took this seriously, almost laughably so; this event was simply a jest at the trend, but some people took it as an actual contest.

Selfies are just one more trend of someone taking a picture of themselves that has blossomed into something larger in today’s social culture. This term will be used for many years to come, so just accept it and have fun with it. It’s not annoying if you don’t make a big deal about it.