What are selfies doing to our brains?

Narcissism? It’s more like being ’stuck in a state of adolescent crisis’, writes Celia Walden

Some time ago, Elsa Godart — a French psychoanalyst and philosopher —treated a girl who had taken semi-naked pictures of herself that went viral.

The girl was distraught (the pictures were intended for her boyfriend alone) “and it all came down to this momentary lapse of consciousness”, Godart explains, “a moment so powerful that all critical thought was suspended — along with any common sense. I found that fascinating.”

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Once she began to delve deeper into the apparently anodyne and playful world of selfies, she found repeated (and sometimes fatal) instances of these “critical blackouts”. Last year, more people were killed taking selfies than in shark attacks, for example (a number of those in the Philippines, the “selfie capital of the world”).

“People are forgetting there’s a cliff behind them, or an oncoming train. And those aren’t the only aberrations: people are taking smiling selfies of themselves in front of Auschwitz and with dying tramps in the street.

Last year, a British parliamentary candidate took a selfie on the Tunisian beach where 38 people had just been gunned down. And at Nelson Mandela’s memorial service, Prime Minister David Cameron, President Barack Obama and the Danish prime minister forgot where they were and leaned in for a selfie. So I became obsessed with finding out how one loses consciousness to that extent.”

Godart is far from alone in her concerns about the selfie trend: at the recent Vogue Festival, psychologist Dr Tanya Byron warned that sexualised, unrealistic images posted by celebrities were fuelling depression and eating disorders in young people. In Godart’s new book, Je selfie donc je suis (I Selfie Therefore I Am), she examines a society she describes as being “stuck in a state of adolescent crisis”.

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Far from giving us a stronger sense of our own identities, she insists, the million-plus selfies taken every day worldwide (the average millennial is expected to take 25 700 selfies in a lifetime) will only propagate insecurities and provoke precisely the kind of neurotic and self-questioning behaviour that characterises adolescence. “We all now have very limited attention spans and very little patience,” Godart says. “Only we forget that adolescence isn’t a very enjoyable time: we don’t know what we stand for or where we’re going, and we’re in a state of crisis, just as society is now.”

Selfies are often lamented as a symptom of narcissism — indeed, last week a study found people who take them tend to overestimate how good-looking they are — but she says that’s not the major problem.

“Narcissism isn’t always bad,” says Godart — who is fond of taking the odd selfie herself. “In fact, it has a useful side: it’s necessary when we’re infants who start out life mesmerised by our own image in the mirror. Small children are literally their own love interests: they find jubilation in pictures of themselves.”

Not unlike Kim Kardashian or Miley Cyrus, then? All of whom seem to be locked into the “mirror stage”, and drawn to any reflective surface in much the same way as my daughter was as a toddler?

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“Actually that’s more a case of egotism: the cult of ‘me’,” corrects the 37-year-old Godart, who is a stickler for clinical terms and looks — perhaps inevitably for a Parisian philosopher — like Isabelle Adjani.

At the heart of the selfie is a contradiction, Godart explains in the book. “What may look like straight-forward narcissism can often be insecurity and a craving for reassurance that you can only ever get from ‘likes’. But you’re chasing the dragon, because far from calming any neuroses down (although it may do this for a second), posting another selfie will only amplify them.”

This may explain extreme cases such as that of Danny Bowman, the British teenager who was treated for body dysmorphic disorder and suicidal thoughts in 2014 after ditching school, locking himself in his room for six months and taking up to 200 photos a day in a quest for the perfect selfie.

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So, is Godart really trying to say that Kim Kardashian does what she does because she’s insecure?

“In her exceptional case,” Godart says wryly, “maybe not. With Kim it points more in the direction of an identity crisis.”

Although the psychoanalyst worries about the number of girls and boys she sees professionally “caught in a social media and reality TV-fuelled obsession with marketing themselves as a product and selling themselves to the world”, Godart is not in the blame game.

“I’m not here to judge or say that this is down to any one celebrity or public figure in particular, because they’re all doing it: just look at the pope, the queen and Obama.

“But where it becomes worrying is when the illusory virtual self you’re selling is more appealing than the real self. So you can photoshop yourself into your ideal and of course that illusion is so perfect that nobody wants real life any more, where you actually have to work really hard to get anything done—or look a certain way. So I could lounge around like a slob all day at home while constructing this shining virtual image of myself online, and that’s going to paralyse my actions in real life, because I can never get anywhere near the perfection of my virtual life.”

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It’s that disparity, along with the isolation of selfie-taking, that concerns her most. One study in the book shows that the more selfies people take, the less sex they have. “It makes sense that the more time spent on oneself in a virtual world, the less open one is going to be to others in any capacity — but certainly sexually.”

There is even a website — beautifulagony.com — where people can post pictures of their faces at the point of orgasm, thus doing away with any need for a sexual partner.

“So although selfies can be anodyne and fun, there is a real danger of us losing our connection to and consciousness of the world around us. I’m not here to make moral judgements; all I would say is this: spend 10 hours a day on the internet if you want, but be capable of going beyond that screen in life, because otherwise what you’re really losing is your own freedom.”

- © The Daily Telegraph, London

 “Je selfie donc je suis” by Elsa Godart is published by Albin Michel

sub_head_start Selfie-made personalities flaunt it sub_head_end

It's no surprise that local stars such as Bonang Matheba, Khanyi Mbau, Roxy Burger, Ntando Duma and Lerato Kganyago are fans of the modernday self-portrait.

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But the trend has even made its way into the upper echelons of the government, with politicians joining in. The minister of razzmatazz, Fikile Mbalula, attracts thousands of likes for selfies that are usually accompanied by captions such as “parliament situation right now #AppropriationBill”.

“Well I like taking selfies because I like my face,” says a giggling Minnie Dlamini, adding that good lighting and knowing one’s best angles were important. “So practise in the mirror.”

The 25-year-old is one of many starlets who frequently post their images online to legions of followers.

“For me, social media has become a huge platform to market ourselves,” says model Shashi Naidoo. The 35- year-old regularly posts selfies to her 73 000 followers on Instagram.

“I specifically know that when I post a picture of fashion, people like it. So you start to see what people like,” she says.

Local lads turning their faces to the most flattering angle for social media consumption include soccer players such as Teko Modise and Siphiwe Tshabalala and television personalities like Chris Jaftha. “I do like taking selfies just because it’s the thing to do on social media,” says Jaftha. “But we look really silly doing it.”

Actress Samkelo Ndlovu, however, said she had no issues with posting selfies. “I own my vanity. It is what it is,” she says. “I think they are a very fun and cute things and my followers like it.”

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But not everybody thinks the trend is all fun and games, ncluding the Independent Electoral Commission. Those making their mark at the polls with a selfie in the voting booth in August will have to think twice as the commission has a plan to take action against them. Deputy CEO Sy Mamabolo said: “The constitution demands that people cast their votes in secret. We are of the view that it should not be encouraged for anyone to take a selfie of the marked ballot.”

And beware: your pout-perfect snapshot could go viral and attract the long arm of the law, as it did for a Durban student last year. When Nicci Redelinghuys posted a selfie of herself driving, she felt the Department of Transport’s ire. The snap showed her leaning out of the window, tongue sticking out, with the caption: “So yesterday I was driving on the N3 trying to take a selfie. lol. I kept looking at the camera and forgetting to watch the road! But I guess finally I got it kind of right! I still look scared as s**t.”

Other selfies have catapulted their subjects into the prying eyes of the public. Pulane Lenkoe was a littleknown law student when her nude selfies (allegedly leaked by her ex-boyfriend) went viral.

She trended for days after that, becoming an overnight star.

- additional reporting by Thembalethu Zulu