What a Silly Way to Die

I’m afraid of snakes; actually terrified of snakes. But, what if I told you that more people die each year taking selfies than die from snake bites? Yes, it’s true. We are living in the age of vanity.

Some people will literally die for the perfect “selfie”. In fact, the trend even has a name: the kilfie. That’s right, people are taking enormous risks to create a photo in search of likes on the social media platform Instagram. The interwebs are littered with articles of The Top Ten Most Dangerous Selfies. Like this one:

This guy is clearly trying to win a Darwin Award. The Darwin Awards recognize individuals who have contributed to human evolution by volunteering to permanently remove themselves from the gene pool by being a total dumb ass.

For example, in 2014, two men in Kenya won a double Darwin Award. They were trampled to death by a wild elephant while posing for selfies with the enormous pachyderm. Photos show the two men touching the elephant’s face just before being gored and trampled to death. The elephant was polite enough to bury the two corpses under some straw to hide the evidence. He left the iPhone untouched, hence the crystal clear photos.

As I like to say to my daughter, “everybody’s just trying to matter in this world”. But it’s getting harder to do that on Social Media. See, Instagram and Facebook are shifting towards algorithmic feeds over friend feeds. The platforms are putting less emphasis on friend’s posts and more emphasis on carefully curated, algorithmic experiences. Things like curated videos and ads that serves up content that’s aligned with your preferences, at least theoretically. The result is a lot fewer eyeballs on your posts. That’s making people do dumber and dumber things to get the same amount of likes.

If narcissism is the disease, selfies are the symptom in the age of vanity. And, those symptoms have become a real nuisance. Just try visiting a national park, like The Grand Canyon. You’ll be awestruck by the beauty….and also irritated by all the selfie sticks and narcissism. People ignore warnings and trample on delicate flora and fauna in an effort to procure the perfect selfie. Many scenic spots are now marked as “no selfie zones” to protect people from themselves.

About twelve people die each year in The Grand Canyon according to park spokeswoman Kirby-Lynn Shedlowski. The park doesn’t track the number of dumb-asses who are killed taking selfies but I’m betting it’s at least half.

The most recent case involves a 70-year old woman who fell to her death in April. She veered off the well-marked path at Mathew Point in search of the perfect selfie. According to the Associated Press, she fell to her death from the Canyon’s rocky cliffs.

Hiker Sophia Cheung plunged to her death while taking a selfie at a waterfall in Hong Kong. That’s her sitting on the edge of a cliff before her death. But, hey, that is a killer pic.

Unfortunately the kilfies aren’t limited to The Grand Canyon. A couple visiting California fell to their deaths off an overlook at Yosemite National Park. Park Rangers discovered the bodies 800 feet below Taft Point, a popular and steep rocky overlook. The bodies were easy to find since their camera and tripod were still sitting 800 feet above on the rocky ledge of Taft Point.

We have an ample supply of narcissistic idiots in the US. But since 2011, India has led the world in selfie related fatalities. In 2018, researchers from the All India Institute of Medical Sciences made a stark discovery. Researchers determined that between 2011 and 2017, half of the world\’s 259 reported selfie deaths occurred in India. The number could actually be much higher since “kilfie” isn’t typically recognized as an official cause of death in India.

Vanity isn’t limited to India. The United States is second in the number of selfie deaths each year. Falls are the leading cause of these deaths, responsible for about one-third of all fatalities. The next leading cause is drowning. And, not surprisingly, men are about twice as likely as women to die in a selfie accident. Probably cause they do stoopid stuff like this guy.

One of the newer trends with the selfie generation is to hire a professional photographer to shoot your selfie. That’s right, you can hire a pro to follow you around on vacation in an effort to capture the most Instagram perfect moments of your trip.

A really good selfie photographer comes armed with professional camera equipment, to include multiple drones for that unforgettable overhead shot. But they can also scope out and reserve the perfect spots for your pics. Like this staged photo below. Does anyone really think that’s a legit, casual photo taken by a random passer-by?

Angle is a professional photography company focused on Instagram vacation photos. They offer local photography services to vacationers in 466 cities and 97 countries. The most serious clients will research other photos taken at the spots they plan to visit. Then Angle photographers help stage those unforgettable shots.

Perhaps the best selfie accident comes from Jared Michael. His YouTube video has been viewed 39,000,000 times. See, Jared was attempting to get a selfie beside a speeding train. I’ll let you watch what happens next, but score this one Train 1, Jared 0.

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