One of my friends recently posted an interesting link on facebook. The link was to a Tumblr. Like many popular tumblrs, this tumblr was full of pictures, but these pictures were all of selfies taken at funerals. This tumblr is a blog for people to post selfies of themselves at funerals.
The culture of the selfie tends to evolve around making silly faces, trying to be sexy, or mocking people. These are perfectly normal things to do, but they seem a little disrespectful at a funeral. At an american funeral, ones demeanor should be sorrowful and reflective. A selfie, doesn’t seem to fit that category.
This new generation, though, brought up by social media might have a harder time presenting their grief. THey are so used to posting every detail about their life on social media sites that it’s almost an instinct to post about something as important as a funeral. The problem though, is that funerals are not a place for pictures. If you think about it, funerals are the one place pictures are not taken. Grief is such a private and personal emotion. Many people don’t like to show grief in public let alone have it memorialized in picture. As a culture we try to move past our grief as quickly as we can. Taking selfies at funerals breaks that barrier.
This new phenomena of selfies is strange enough. But it is a phenomena that embodies the next generation of Americans. Maybe our culture is changing in a way that will allow pictures not just at funerals but at all occasions, but I’m not sure if that’s for the best. http://selfiesatfunerals.tumblr.com/
One response to “Selfies at Funerals”