The typical cultural icon of this decade is undoubtedly the ‘selfie’. With even ‘selfie expert’ cellphones grabbing eyeballs, the ubiquitous selfie culture defines today’s citizen, from presidents and prime ministers to picnickers and platform vendors. Taking wing on the speed-record-smashing electronic media, images reach any part of the globe before you bat an eyelid.
The selfie obsession pays no homage to conventional discretion. It becomes an overpowering urge, sending logic and good sense into a tizzy. Selfie addicts pose before speeding trains and take shots from train roofs — and leave tragic memories on the tracks. Others are thrilled by defying heights and balance precariously on cliffs, precipices and edges of skyscrapers, often plunging to the gaping depths, camera and selfie in hand. Many of those who have tried these fate-defying shots have not lived to see their selfies. Others are not intimidated by the open jaws of deadly crocodiles and venture to have their selfies shot closest to the beast. Like Tennyson’s Light Brigade, they crave to charge ‘into the jaws of death’ most eagerly. Or getting extremely close to tigers in zoos, they pose at impossible angles for a shot, and take a fatal fall, unable to escape Newton’s laws of gravity. Yet, the call of the selfie adventure goes on inexorably like the seducing voice of the enchantress in Keats’s subtly chilling poem La Belle Dame sans Merci .
Emulating Narcissus
If the Greek mythical figure Narcissus had a camera, he would probably have been the world’s first selfie expert. Falling fatally in love with his own reflection in the water, he could not tear himself away from his watery Facebook browsing and neglected distracting things like eating and drinking, shrinking day by day and vanishing from the face of the earth.
The selfie would definitely not have found favour with the Greek philosopher Plato. For him the real world is not the one we live in but the world of ideas, and things on this earth are only poor copies or imitations of the ideal world. And he considered art and poetry imitation of an imitation and therefore of little value. The philosopher Descartes debunked the ‘Maya’ theory of reality by betting on his thought process: “I think, therefore I am.” If he could live in our times he would have said, “I click, therefore I exist.”
The mirror is probably the first artificial device that shows our physical image. It is the source of self-admiration, handsome income for some and of desperation to the less-well-endowed. As Hamlet said, ‘God gave them one face but they make themselves another’ to earn the compliments of the looking glass. Today, plastic surgery has reduced many to tears and penury.
Some have come to grief because of dubious surgical procedures, in the process even losing their face in more than one sense. Believed to have undergone numerous plastic surgery sessions, singer Michael Jackson’s natural look is probably known by very few.
Images of power
The visual impact of images is not at all lost on politicians. Dictators such as Stalin and Mao in the past, and North Korean President Kim Jong-Un today, have made sure they have their huge portraits prominently displayed in halls and public places to remind subjects that everyone is under their gaze and power.
On the other hand, dictators have banned the display of any portraits they consider dangerous to their career. During the communist occupation of Poland, when young Pope John Paul II was the auxiliary Bishop of Cracow, there was a running battle of wits between him and the communist officials. To suppress Christian influence, the government banned the carrying of the famous portrait of the Black Madonna at the Marian procession. The ecclesiastic had the frame of the picture carried during the event without the picture and the faithful flocked to the feast, knowing full well whose portrait had been placed there.
Some religions also have their reservations about having images of divinity or saints. Primitive peoples could easily mistake image for the reality. Moreover, God can never be adequately expressed in images. The Old Testament forbade the making or worshipping of any image of Yahweh. Some Protestant churches and Muslims forbid sacred images.
The cultural tension between the ‘flash and display-all’ and ‘cover and conceal-all’ mentality is not likely to ease any time soon. Meanwhile, ‘dare-all, share-all and blare-all’ seems to be ruling credo today.
adukanildb@gmail.com
