Selfies: The Art of Arrogance and Low Self-Esteem

You can already tell via the title that this is gonna be ugly. Not like your latest selfie, but you get the picture. 

I've always been under the assumption that taking a selfie should be a lot like taking a drivers license photo; it should be used to identify, recognize, and empathize with a person and their words. However, it is not. It's nothing like it, in fact.

Selfies are so prominent that it was added to the Oxford dictionary. It's an Internet disease that impacts not only people now, but something that will be passed on to the youth of today. Think about what kind of future that is going to leave for the generation after this one. Millennials are definitely at a huge disadvantage and are more susceptible to willingly take on the psychosis and traits that accompany taking insane amounts of pictures of yourself. 

We traveled 238,900 miles to the moon and took 5 pictures. Some people walk a few paces to the bathroom and take 50.

What about mental health? From a purely psychological viewpoint selfies have been linked to a number of mental illnesses that the exhibitionist is not well aware of. It's obvious that the picture taker is delving into self-objectification, which researchers have linked to the "Dark Triad" - narcissism, psychopathy, and machievellianism. They're called “dark” because they have an almost evil connotation and are associated with a callous and manipulative way of interacting with other people.

Not familiar with these terms? Let me help you out with some definitions, so you can see the congruency:

Narcissism: Extreme self-centeredness and a grandiose view of oneself. Narcissists have an excessive need to be admired by others and have a sense of entitlement. They’re likely to agree with statements like “I’m more capable than most people” and “I will usually show off if I get the chance”.

Psychopathy: Impulsivity and lack of empathy. Those high in psychopathy are likely to agree with statements like “Payback needs to be quick and nasty."

Machiavellianism: Manipulative-ness without regard for others’ needs. Those high on this trait tend to have little concern about morals.

Self-objectification: This is a tendency to view your body as an object based on its sexual worth. Those high in self-objectification tend to see themselves in terms of their physical appearance and base their self-worth on their appearance.

In truth, I have anxiety. I'm not perfect, by any means. It's something I have dealt with all of my life; however, I am aware of it. But what I'm not going to do is take a picture of myself to parade it on social media. So much hangs on how many likes or favorites they get that the individual is fixated on some sick level of acceptance or admiration that feels like failure if not reciprocated. It grows and grows over the hours to where the person now completely doubts themselves and either take more or delete their post all together. Not everyone is like that though.

Some say, "I just take one with the duck face real quick, then go in to work" or some shit like that. Why? What purpose does that serve? If you think about what people can read underneath the picture, it's shallow reasoning to illicit a complement. Others say "It's just fun and playful to take pictures of myself." That sounds incredibly narcissistic too, but you may disagree. If something is fun, how can that be so bad? Well, Mr. Bubble causes urinary track infections, so maybe things that are fun and childish aren't so very good for you.

You may think I am making this sound disgusting and detrimental to your health, which I am. That's just how I feel about it and I am not going to disguise it. But is it really that bad for you? I think so.

You can always sit there and say that it isn't that hurtful, or even saying something so ridiculous like it is helpful. Of course, there was that Erynn Johns kid who got saved after being caught in a riptide and was pulled out by her selfie stick, but that's a very rare occurrence. That shouldn't even really qualify as an example, actually. There is nothing that a picture of yourself does to serve anyone else except to utilize for identification.

As for my own research, I didn't poll the people I unfollowed in my feed after many unscrupulous selfies, but I'm sure they would disagree with everything I and all the psychologists I've researched have to say about it. But it's quite easy to understand that denial, embarrassment, and transparency can cause a person to backlash, which is fine. I have lost a few online friends because of my views on this subject, but I'm sure they won't be the last. People really love seeing themselves a certain way and will continue to do so despite the information provided for them. 

But you don't have to. You can change... If you want. Shit, it is your life. Don't just show off what you see in the mirror, but look deep into the person staring back at you. Whether you like it or not, it's the same thing we see everyday. 

Just remember, we all know what you look like. You don't have to remind us every chance you get.

I'd like to expressly thank Dr. Gwendolyn Seidman, Ph.D. of Albright College and all those who helped her research for her article in Psychology Today

TOP 20 MST3K EPISODES (Part 2: TOP 10)

Finishing my Top 20 MST3k episodes. This is my Part Duex, the Top 10. Check out the Blog from last week for 11-20. This is my TOP 10... And here we go:

10: Outlaw (of Gor) - Starring, as Tv's Frank says, "the very huggable Jack Palance", this is the sequel to a movie made from a book of the same name. As a writer, I would be ashamed of my work after watching this horrible display of poor screenwriting, poor editing, poor everything. Perhaps the book is better. But I'm not going to read it. I mean, why?! If this film has anything going for it, it is casting Jack Palance in a bewilderingly shallow role in a movie about an uninteresting hero and his bumbling sidekick sent back to an unentertainingly dystopian desert world. I'll give it that. But nothing else. 

9: Deathstalker & The Warriors From Hell - I personally love the Hell out of this one (see what I did there?)! Think of this crapfest as a Game of Thrones episode without all the awesome stuff that makes Game of Thrones awesome. So, essentially, it's just like going to a Renaissance Festival and watching some part-timers do their schtick for a whole hour and a half, which Mike and the bots lampoon in some of their best bits. However, this is much cheaper than going anywhere and you'll have a much better time.

8: Soultaker - I think my little sister still has my copy of this, but I'm always happy to let people borrow my dvd's. Except when they don't return them! J/k. No, seriously though, I really need that one. This is an extreme example of how one girl can completely botch a decent movie just by using it as a platform to build herself up. Nothing against what's her name, but she never really had a big budget for such an endeavor. They do give a great shout out to Joe Estevez as "Martin Sheen's under appreciated, more talented brother." It is strictly a low-budget thriller from the 80's with no attention paid to cinematography or dialogue.

7: Puma Man - Puma Man. Puma Man. Puma Man... The name itself is stupid. If you repeat it enough (just like the beginning of the movie), it becomes a lampoon of itself. Because let's face it; the premise is an ancient Mayan God from wherever came down from the skies and bestowed the power of a puma to some nerdy dude which allowed him to fly. Wait... Pumas fly? Well, that's his only power, which he does using effects from a 1920's Superman green screen. Oh, and Donald Pleasance is in it.

6: Catalina Caper - Tommy Kirk is probably the best/worst actor of the 60's. Story told... Although, the riff at the beginning about burning books is one of the most prolific parts; I mean, a bunch of sex-stranged teens dancing around a campfire almost sequesters an abhorrent book-burning bit. The plot is about as basic as the title of a 60's summer beach party flick could be: it's a story about a caper on Catalina Island. Little Richard makes a small cameo seemingly strung out and sweating buckets through his poofy quaff in the blazing SoCal sun. But, if not for anything, this light-hearted beach romp is definitely one of a kind for Joel and the bots.

5: Manos (The Hands Of Fate) - Considered by many to be the worst film ever made. This should at least give you a set up as to how bad this film actually is! The movie was originally made by a real estate agent who lost a bet. Yeah. By far, it has one of the best invention exchanges with Joel and the mads giving each other a chocolate bunny guillotine and a comic strip morpher. They are also able to make a memorable character of the goat-legged, odd caretaker in the movie, Torgo, as a cinematic icon forever to be remembered from this steaming pile of film debauchery.

4: Escape 2000 - Originally named "Escape From The Bronx", which is pretty easy to tell bc the first 10 minutes is a bunch of guys in hazmat suits and flame throwers telling everyone to "Leave the Bronx" over loudspeakers. Not too big of an issue, except for the glaring fact that it was obviously shot on a soundstage in Italy. A sequel to 1990: The Bronx Warriors, the actor portraying the main character (appropriately named "Trash") vanished from the media limelight after being blamed for the film's failure for losing all of his muscle mass in between films. Kinda harsh considering the kid was 17 at the time.

3: Space Mutiny - Written, directed, and completely botched by David Winters, this complete wreck of a movie (with what seems like special effects made by Kenner and wholly lifted from the original Battlestar Galactica TV series) is considered by many as "quite possibly the worst science fiction/space adventure film made in English", which means it's pretty bad. The chase scene with bowling alley floor waxers is pretty dope tho.

2: The Final Sacrifice - Rank with the bacony-stench of Canada all over it, the saving grace of this movie is introducing us to one of screendomes greatest heroes, Zap Rowsdower: an out-of-shape drunk with curly, red hockey hair and tight, white jeans that refuse to get dirty. Helping the protagonist, it's one of the most odd, confusing, obligatory, and pushed tandems of all time; the protagonist being a skinny, unappealing little twerp of a preteen with the charisma of a housefly. With all of this, doubled with some of the greatest lines ever to come from Mike Nelson, Crow T. Robot, and Tom Servo, make this one of the greatest episodes ever. Hands down!

1: Mitchell - Number One on this list goes to this 70's cop yarn starring the unkempt, overweight, and unapologetically smug titular character played by the unkempt, overweight, and unapologetically smug Joe Don Baker. Now, when I was making this list, I took a lot of things into consideration; so much so, that I made into a Top 20 (2-parter) instead of a mere Top 10. But, of course, that wasn't too much of a problem because of how much I love this damn show. One basis of criteria, though it might not seem like it, was a healthy balance of episodes featuring Joel Hodgson and those featuring Mike Nelson. This episode was the transition between creator (Joel) and head writer (Mike) as host of the show due to creative differences with the channel provider. That fact, and the fact that Joe Don Baker was reportedly so furious with the mockery they made of this movie that he physically threatened anyone associated with it, which I find even more hilarious. I'm sure he wasn't the only one, but that got the most attention. But this is a one-of-a-kind gem that anyone who has never seen the show, or even just a few episodes should check out. Today.

Well, that does it for my list of Top 20 Mystery Science Theater 3000 episodes! This was a lot of fun for me, although a little bit of a detraction from my usual posts. But, hey, it's my Blog. I do what I want.

TOP 20 MST3K EPISODES (Part 1: #11-20)

After being a huge fan of the show since I was a little kid, I have seen every Mystery Science Theater ever made. Some I watch over and over again because they are just so damn good! So, I had an idea to list the Top 10 episodes of my favorite tv show, Mystery Scince Theater 3000... But I had such a hard time makin the list that I extended out to the Top 20.

This week I give you the Top 11-20 MST3K episodes, followed by the Top 10 next week.

Now, if you've never seen any of these episodes, or any episode period, I suggest you take the time to watch them right now! I'm sure you can find them on Netflix, iTunes, or YouTube.com. And if you don't agree with my list, make your own and share. In the meantime, enjoy!

20: Laserblast - Leanord Maltin gave it 2 1/2 stars, which I hope was based on a 10 star scale, but probably not. Although it is the screen debut of Eddie Deezen and features Roddy McDowall in a few scenes before involving himself in a very confusing death scene. It's about a shirtless teenager in the desert who gets a lasergun attached to his arm which also changes him into a psychotic alien. The real story is trying to figure out what they two cute little claymation aliens are talking about, but Mike and the bots translate for them very well.

19: Zombie Nightmare - When a group of suburban teenagers start terrorizing a small town, they accidentally run over a local softball-playing, robbery-stopping badass whose mother exacts revenge with the help of a Voodoo witch doctor. The story then barely shows the muscular revenant exacting his revenge on the teenage hoodlums. With a confused Adam West miscast as the police chief, his cameo is the only reason anyone had even heard of this dimly-lit roll of toilet paper.

18: Bloodlust - Based on "The Most Dangerous Game", which I think we all read sometime around middle school, this story revolves around a group of teenagers who decide to venture to the shore of an "uninhabited" island for a clam bake, but end up captured by a man who hunts humans for sport. Of course, knowing more about the film's protagonist, Robert Reed, we know just what kind of private island he'd rather have. But this movie lives on not as his screen debut, but one of the best episodes with Mike and the bots.

17: Riding With Death - We all know Death doesn't chip in for gas though. Ben Murphy leads a two-star cast in the made-for-TV movie that aired on NBC in 1976. Originally meant to be a TV show, the plot's continuity seems almost like two separate movies in one. Loosely based on "The Invisible Man", the main charachter and even the truck itself disappears. If H.G. Wells would stab himself in the neck if he saw this sack of crap.

16: Merlin's Shop of Mystical Wonders - Merlin's back and he's insane! Not really. Ernest Borgnine recalls horrific tales of terror that he wrote about the sorcerer to his grandson when the power goes out. The two stories he recants are one a lot like "the Monkey's Paw" except it's a toy monkey that claps cymbals together instead. The one before it, however, is terrifying about a man who uses Merlin's book for evil and has demonic things happen to him. How or why this movie was geared towards children, I'll never know.

15: Dead Talk Back - A wonderfully forgettable film involving a mystery surrounding a house full of strange characters, all of whom have reasons why they would kill the victim. They tell who the victim is and when she will be killed at the very beginning, so at that point it just becomes a countdown to when the murder takes place. With the inept policemen baffled, they turn to one of the tenants, a scientist who talks to the dead, to trick the murderer into implicating himself. You can imagine how many jokes hit the nail on the head in this one.

14: Werewolf - Starring another acclaimed actor to make this list, Joe Estevez! Overlooking that it must've been a full night every single night while this movie was made, most of the "werewolves" in this movie become on by being scratched by dead parts of lingering body parts of old "werewolves". Since the continuity of what the werewolf is exactly supposed to look like differs from actor to actor, it's easy to see why this poorly-made film was busted up as easily as it was by our heroes.

13: Agent Of H.A.R.M - Looking for another James Bond film from the 60's, drenched in nostalgia and devoid of a main plot? Then look no further for Agent of H.A.R.M., which stands for Hot And Ready Man! Adam Chance is your hero who really doesn't do anything except hit on girls 20-30 years younger than him. The best parts are when one of the villains who never takes his sunglasses off talks like Prince throughout the movie.

12: Parts (the Clonus Horror) -Peter Graves starred in this oddly forgettable B-movie before he went on to do Biography. Although he'd been in a few other MST3k's, this was the only one to make my list. One part a science fiction look at corporate greed and the other a story of teenage growing up and rebellion. A movie called The Island came out some decades later that pretty much mimicked this movie entirely, but the original hold more affinity because it landed itself on MST3k, which endears it to us all.

11: Hobgoblins - If Gremlins was made with $15,000 as opposed to $11 million, it would be this reject from the Jim Henson house of production. It feels like the producers just found a bunch of the same handpuppets in storage and threw together a stupid, nonsensical script that is almost a complete rip-off of the movie I named before. God help whoever shoveled money on this travesty.


...


Now, check back next Sunday for numbers #1-10!

Looking Inward

I've never been one for cliques. Being accepted into the fold. The pack. The gaggle. The murder.

Remembering back to when I was a kid, I am sure there was moments when I felt the need to express myself and have my ideas and thoughts accepted. I can recall even giving up my ideals for that acceptance too because I wanted it so much. I suppose, in many ways, we all grow up wishing for such things. Some achieve it at the expense of others, themselves, or both. But most of the time the price isn't worth it.

The fact that I never was truly accepted anywhere helped me become the man I am today. I always fell into the right spot when I didn't try, and that, to me, is the most important thing for me to remember. Whether it was through music, passion, hobbies, or joy, I am adorned with fond memories from my past of those who loved and accepted me when I did one thing correctly - I was myself.

There are other sides to it, however. Struggling to fit in anywhere as a traveling bartender has always been a bit of a chore. I can say that pushing for acceptance amongst my peers was definitely the wrong thing to do first coming in to a town where I didn't know anybody. Drinking heavily on top of that definitely made it worse. Alcohol elevates people's personalities exponentially, and when you work in a field where the product is such a catalyst for that you can lose sight of what is important very quickly.

So, I recognized the problem and dealt with it.

It's one of the most disheartening things in the world to either fuck up a job you have all the experience and awards in the world in, or have it stripped from you. Is it a bad job to have though? Nope. Sure, the money is great, it's exciting, and you meet all sorts of new people to whom you have some of the most interesting stories in the world for, but I think I went at it all wrong.

I wasn't being me.

When you lose sight of the initiative and what's important, others can see it clearly. It's difficult as hell to know what others perceptions of you are. In fact, it's practically impossible. I only say "practically" because you can ask the people. You can change the things that are wrong in your life, but only when you recognize them - either by yourself or with the help of others. Believing in yourself is one thing, but being an asshole about it without taking other people in to consideration is another. Dulling your inhibitions and consciousness doesn't make it any better. In fact, it makes it worse.

When I moved to Gainesville a few months ago, I was living with a kid that had all sorts of problems. Not to say I was the admirable quality of life that may sound like because I have my own issues, obviously, but he would constantly say he wanted to die, then drink himself into a coma every single night. I'd hear him and his friends through the paper-thin walls all throughout the night, then popping open cans of beer first thing in the morning. I suppose in many ways he reminded me of myself when I was that age - 21, all alone, yet surrounded by friends and loved ones. Knowing how alone this poor kid felt on his 22nd birthday, I decided to hang out with him, having just been cut back at my last job and nothing to do but make him not want to kill himself. At least for one day. At least on his birthday. We were almost kicked out of a full movie theater after he snuck in a pint of Sailor Jerry, then went downtown where he was immediately kicked out of a party for being borderline molest-ant some months before. We were then kicked out of a bar downtown because he was groping the doorman. Yes, the doorman. Like I said, he had some major issues.

But it reminded me of myself. Not the actions, of course, but the non-compliant, antisocial, drunken, disorderly approach with little or no regard to those around me whether it affected them directly or indirectly. They say the things you hate about other people are the things you see in yourself. Not to say everyone would hate these actions for the same reason, but they definitely showed something about myself to me. Whenever I or my ideas or actions were not accepted, I blamed the other person for being "wrong" or "incorrect", which was pure ignorance. Instead, I became a victim of my own thoughts and tragically continued on a path of alcoholism and denial.

I guess the point I am trying to make here is that once struggling to fit in no longer became an issue, I revolted against the cliques. I went against the grain. I would push against the pack. But, you see, that's where I was wrong because it was never them. It never was the cliques and groups I blamed. The problem was and always had been me.

I refused to just be myself.

We are all working pieces in a world where everything is moving and temporary. We mustn't force what is not there, but rather accept things for what they are and leave them better than when we found it. And somewhere in that mess, I believe we will truly find ourselves...

And we should never choose to fight who we are.

That's my two cents.