“Look at me!” – an existential threat

My recent experiences in the Redwoods further pushed some thinking from readings and observations about the existential threat of today’s humans seemingly irrational drive to attract attention to themselves. The “Look at me!” drive I am starting to name it. This human drive seems in today’s modern cultural mix as strong as that of hunger, thirst and reproduction. Selfie culture is the apex of this drive.

Selfie actions are so irrational that Wikipedia has a page on “List of selfie-related injuries and deaths”.

What the redwoods solidified was the consistent observation of humans leaving the trails, climbing all over fragile ecosystems, ignoring the creatures (including the trees) around them, and only focused on getting the right ‘selfie’. That selfie of course has to be shared with friends, contacts and strangers so as many people as possible fulfill the “look at me” closure – liking or commenting.

The shallow artificiality of the entire practice is not that interesting, at least to me. The absolute disregard of any damage to self or environment to ‘stage’ that selfie is the existential threat. Anything can be destroyed unintentionally or intentionally as long as the selfie generates enough “look at me!” feeling.

If the selfie isn’t enough, humans consistently disrespect wildlife to the point of putting themselves in great danger and disrupting the natural day to day activities of wildlife – often done to catch a great selfie, or to post on social media – another move to get people to “look at me!”.

Dangerous egotistical superficiality … an existential threat that starts to subordinate life for an image that is ‘all about me’.