Cuckoo

During the eighties, being star-struck has a different reaction. The shriek is there and the religious awe of having the O-shaped mouth and the screaming were present as well. But the fans’ urge was to hug the star and try to plant a kiss or two on the personality. For months, the experience will be relived through the staccato delivery of the event to friends and acquaintances.

Today, the fans still scream and shriek shrilly. But the main goal is to get a selfie with the star so that they could post the pictures on the social media sites to be ogled by real-life and virtual friends.

Again, the question could be raised: is the picture more important than the experience? Is there a need to take a picture with famous personalities so that such fame could be experienced by the person once he/she posts the pictures on Facebook and other sites?

Social media have introduced a contemporary shift from broadcast to participatory media, through which content can now be produced, manipulated, and distributed by everyone with internet access (Jenkins, 2006). Because of this fact, anyone could now be a model, an actor or a singer in their own ways since there are platforms where they could upload their own versions of being a model, actor, musician, etc.

Humans have long demonstrated an interest in self-exploration. From early Greeks to present day, people have used self-study and self-observation to explore identity and sense of self. Trying to figure out who we are and what we’re about is a distinctly human pursuit for almost everyone (Ruthledge, 2013).

To date, discourses about the cultural meanings of selfies have tended to extremes. For understandable reason, marketers deploy selfies as an indicator that one is young, fun, and connected. Yet in news stories, it is almost impossible to encounter a discussion of selfies that does not dabble in discourses of pathology. Each month or so, a news article appears linking taking selfies to harmful mental states such as narcissism (Nauert, 2015), body dysmorphia (McKay, 2014), or even psychosis (Gregoire, 2015).

Lately, there seems to be an alarming data on people taking their own lives. Suicide cuts across culture and social status to the point that there seems to be a trend on be a collective concern on mental health. Depression is of course a serious matter but it is only one of the many illnesses of the mind. So, discussions on mental health must not be limited to being depressed. What about people with delusions of grandeur? What about those who have insecurities even if they are already adults? What about those who wallow in envy and those who thrive on anger all the time?

A strong relationship has been found between selfie addiction and various mental health issues like poor self-esteem, narcissism, loneliness and depression. Addiction with selfie in youth, especially teenagers and mental health issues are on the rise as many psychiatrists are seeing number of parents coming with the same complaint. Therefore, it is right time to sensitize parents, teachers and educators about the alarming increase in selfie addiction and its deteriorating impact on mental health of adolescents (Kaur & Vig, 2016).

It stems back to the journey within the SELF. It has been mentioned countless times that self-assessment is a healthy option since we could perform transcendence. There is a continuous quest of improving our own selves since we are the only persons in control with our quirks. We also need to listen to feedback since there are instances when our illnesses are our blind spots. 

Having the mental health law recently signed is a soothing balsam to the impending ailment threatening the society. There will be policies and laws to be created for the betterment of the people. Yet, it takes a strong and self-observant person to know whether he/she is trekking the SANE ground or he/she is flying over the cuckoo’s nest.