'Selfie tourism' - AIBU?

[SunflowerPosers]

This weekend I went to a beautiful sunflower field not far from where I live (NC for this as don't want it to be too outing), and I just wondered if anyone else feels the same way as me or whether I'm being too judgey and unreasonable?

There I was with my little DSLR camera trying to get some nice photos of sunflowers, and I couldn't believe the number of people who clearly thought the place existed for their own personal photo shoot.

Women (of a range of ages, not just the early 20s 'influencers') all clearly dressed up, doing 'candid' poses (where they deliberately don't look at the camera for some reason), instructing increasingly exasperated partners to take 20 more photos of them doing very similar poses. People walking around with obnoxiously large 'selfie sticks' where they've got the camera trained only on themselves the whole time, rather than just taking a moment to put their phone down and be present.

Maybe it's my age, but I don't really get it, and just think it all looks so cringeworthy. Of course, I understand wanting to get one or two photos of yourself in a nice location, but some people seem to take it to an extreme level of narcissistic behaviour.

And it seems to be common at so many places now. Go anywhere pretty, and you can barely move for the amount of people with selfie sticks. I'm half convinced that a lot of people you see on walks are only interested in getting photos of themselves to show where they've been, rather than actually enjoying walking!

Apparently there's a term for this sort of thing that I wasn't aware of, selfie tourism. People who specifically go to a location to get the perfect photo of themselves, rather than appreciating where they actually are.

Please tell me I'm not the only one who thinks this is crazy?

Personally I like to look out for all the older women who look judgmental and point them out

oh wait, that would be sexist and ageist of me, wouldn’t it?

I’m 27 lol. You clearly haven’t read my posts properly. I already said I’m not part of the older generation. Also, did I say anywhere on any of my posts that it’s just women I see doing this? No, you said that. I said “people” every single time. In my last post I also said I don’t think it’s a generational thing, I think it’s a personality thing. So basically every point you’ve assumed I’m making is wrong 🤣 as my most recent post states, the worst offender I know is in her 60s. As a young woman I’m just relieved I have enough internal self-confidence and emotional security not to have to gain validation from such an obviously fake depiction of the perfect life

@RainSoakedNights Don’t take it so personally. I am the mother of a young woman (nearly 20). I certainly don’t think she is a vain narcissist, nor are her friends. They do take selfies, but DD rarely posts them online. And what she definitely doesn’t do is join queues of people at beauty spots to engage in full-on photoshoots, while spoiling others’ view and failing to actually appreciate the beauty with her own eyes.

I think many of us complaining are older. It’s because we know how important it is to be in the moment. Be in it, feel it, experience it. Life is short!

Then stop slagging off young women for daring to put makeup on or take a photo or three!

Then you’re just judgmental, I’m not sure that’s any better? You have a very strange view of the world

@RainSoakedNights Where did you get the idea that I think my view is the only one that matters? I also have not called you vain or a narcissist.

Thank you for telling me about your beauty regime. I’ll be honest, it’s of no interest to me whatsoever but thank you anyway.

Can you show me where I have slagged off women for wearing make up? What time did I post that?

You’re the one on here being absolutely vile about young women enjoying themselves. If I were to make comments about the older posters on this thread, I’d be called sexist and ageist and potentially banned. But that’s life I guess

Taking photos is fine. People have been taking photos since cameras were invented. Turning every nice place in the world into a queue of organised self adoration - with nowhere that people can just wander around without being tutted at or asked to move for the sake of the mighty 'gram - isn't.

@RainSoakedNights Please tell me which of my comments you found vile. Please also tell me in which post I slagged off women for wearing make up. (I also don’t believe you’ll find the word ‘young’ in any of my posts. In fact the Korean women I witnessed in Santorini were mostly middle aged.)

I’ll wait.

It’s the general tone, isn’t it? Both you and @purpledaze24. Deriding women for doing what they want to do with their bodies and time. If they want to take a million photos, let them! It doesn’t speak to anything about their character.

THIS!!!

I'm not someone who takes tonnes of selfies but I do ask my DH and my friends to grab photos of me and my son while we're out and I try to take a few family photos too. If I didn't take the odd selfie I would almost be erased from the family's photographic history!

They don't get shared on social media. I just want them so that my children and I can look back on them in many years to come and enjoy reminiscing together as I have with my parents.
Family photos and the stories they told were incredibly important to my late grandmother while she was suffering with dementia.

It's very sneery to say they are ALL vain and self-obsessed and "look at me" as is being portrayed on this thread. They can't ALL be influencers. Maybe, just maybe, photography has other purposes.

Nobody seems able to accept that though. Every young woman must be a wannabe influencer with no sense of purpose or confidence. It’s actually disgusting.

No, I won’t accept being called vile or accused of ‘slagging off women for wearing make up’ or deriding young women when I have categorically not done this.

As for ‘letting’ people take millions of photos- I’m hardly in a position to stop anyone 😂

But I am free to believe and to say online that I think people who set up elaborate photoshoots while ignoring the view are vapid and shallow, and that there are many healthy ways to improve self-esteem- this isn’t one.

We have a bluebell wood near us. Every year it's destroyed by people wanting to photograph their partners, kids, dogs running through it. fuckers.

What’s better being judgemental or old?! Yikes. I think you’re the one being ageist 😬 I don’t think being this defensive and arguing with every poster on here who you don’t agree with is going to get you anywhere. You also seem confused about what you’re arguing about. You seem to think people are criticising you for dressing up and enjoying putting on make-up, I enjoy doing those things too, it makes me feel good about myself too. No one is criticising you for doing that. Or for taking photos of yourself when you feel like you’re looking good. I do that too, I think a lot of people do (I don’t post them though). I also have social media and post photos, I’m in some of them obviously, some of them are selfies but the selfies are usually funny/silly ones or just a quick one with friends. Occasionally I’ll take a selfie if I’ve been somewhere cool or really interesting. But the difference is it’d be a quick one, it’d be genuine, and the focus would be on this cool place I went. I’d never spend half an hour posing till I found the right one, or take a photo of me looking wistfully out across the horizon with some brooding look on my face. To me that is just cringe. There’s plenty of people on my SM who do do that and I just feel sorry for them that they feel the need to spend so long curating this idealised version of their lives and the kind of person they are, that has no basis in reality. And also, for the people like my aunt who just constantly lie on SM with cherry-picked photos about how perfect their lives are and how they are constantly having so much fun with ALL the people that love them SO much. I just don’t get it, are they really so insecure that they need other people to feel jealous of their lives (if they fall for it!) I’m also not the only woman in her 20s who feels like this. Not all young women are selfie-obsessed! None of my close friends would behave in the ways I’ve described. And I know I’m judgemental and I’m fine with that. Everyone’s judgmental about something and this is something that pisses me off

Oh, there we go. So I’m ageist if I say anything about being old, but it’s okay to paint all young women as idiots 😂 bowing out now because there’s no point continuing

Taking the piss out of other people, taking photos of strangers and sharing them on an Instagram group chat with your like minded friends to ridicule sounds like a great way to spend your free time. It’s important to have a hobby.

Yeah probably a good idea. Next time if you’re going to try and argue a point make sure you get your facts straight and understand what you’re actually arguing about first. Eg. I literally said “not all young women are like this” (myself included) and you just accused me of “painting all young women as idiots”. Your arguments don’t even make sense lol

Aw you sound delightful

You name changed because worried that thread will be outing

is that because you have whinged to loads of people in RL about this OP?

I'm probably going to out myself to anyone who knows me. I am an amateur portrait photographer.

Obviously i am not taking selfies, but i am taking photos of women in public locations so this is more a commentary on wanting nice photos of yourself and what that says about a person.

Wanting a beautiful photo of yourself doesn't automatically make you vain or self obsessed.

I've seen first hand, dozens of times, the difference a beautiful dress, location, and a stunning photo can make to a woman's mental health and perception of herself. I don't photoshop. I don't care if my models posts their photos online. If they do, more power to them - the vast majority are so thrilled that they do post them. I do it for free. I'm not aware that we get in the way of people who want to photograph a flower.

I have probably done about 100-150 shoots over the past few years. I have worked with multiple cancer survivors who wanted to celebrate the end of their treatment. I've worked with women who have survived abuse. I've worked with old women, fat women, young women, thin women, middle aged women, professional models, normal women, menopausal women, pregnant women. Basically - any women who want to feel good about themselves and feel empowered.

We've shot at beaches, parks, castles, meadows, woods, stately homes.

If anyone saw one of my shoots happen, a lot of people here on this thread would judge the fuck out of it. You'd probably think i was just someone taking a photo of a vain, self obsessed woman. Thankfully that doesn't happen in real life. People keep their views to themselves. Nobody who sees our shoots happening knows why we are doing it but they might think my subjects are vapid, vain and self obsessed. In reality, when passers by sometimes ask what we are doing, then they often tell me their story and want to shoot with me too.

What i would find more sad is that someone would judge another person for doing something that made them feel good about themselves when it has no bearing on their life at all, past having to wait a minute to get their own picture at a scenic spot.

As for my children, they're fine, don't worry about them. My children see me using my skills to help all kinds of women who have been through stuff to feel good about themselves. They are more than happy to help me scout locations and find outfits for my client closet. They think it's brilliant.

Next time you see someone trying to get a nice photo of themselves - maybe think about other explanations other than they are just doing it for Instagram likes.

@Candlesandmatches in between jobs? Not much going on?

Humans have always been interested in their appearance and capturing attractive images of themselves - though that’s something that was historically the preserve of the rich and powerful who could get paintings and statues.

So you could say all the smartphone era has done is democratise this instinct - only the privileged few could pose for an oil painting, anyone can pose for a selfie.

But I do think the dominance of the “selfie” is warping our culture in a way that’s unhealthy because it increasingly seems to be an obsession with the superficial to the detriment of connecting with people and places in a deeper way.

I really don’t think this is what people are talking about though. It’s the people prancing about taking entire photo shoots of themselves, stopping everyone else enjoying the actual sight they’ve come to see, making everybody stay back until they’ve finished, and not even appearing to once look at or enjoy the actual sight themselves - it’s like it’s just a prop in the background and the main attraction is their own face.

I love a bit of Instagram and I’m not some ancient hag, but the experience of travelling/visiting places has been TOTALLY changed by this over the last decade. I’m not bemoaning the presence of other tourists, or harking back to a time when you’d be the only person there, but it used to be that at you’d be a crowd all looking at and enjoying the sight together, if that makes sense? It just feels different now that so many people are just there to take pictures of themselves.