Ego Schmego
Friday, March 30, 2007
I know this may incite a maelstrom of haterade, but I really have to get this out of my system.

I simply cannot stand bloggers who constantly post photos of themselves online. I really hate the whole "365 days" photo project, and I don't understand the whole "oh look at me I'm so ugly won't you please compliment me?!" tone of their posts.

It is one thing to study self-portraiture as progressive, introspective art - a mixed media that involves so many variations on the theme of "self," but it is another thing indeed to call a bunch of overly photoshopped SPs "art." Where do we draw the blogging line between ego and art?

I have gotten so annoyed recently with certain bloggers that I'll stop reading them, and then come back later hoping that the constant stream of imagery and self-deprecation stops. But they don't. And it doesn't. What's even more frustrating is that these bloggers are smart, funny, sassy, warm, intelligent writers. For the most part, I like what they have to say and how they say it - I just cannot stand the insipid tone of some of the posts, and the inevitable fawning on the comment boards. I gave these blogs the best of my attentions and time, but I can't take it anymore.

Do these bloggers feel that their lives are so harried that they choose to fill their rare "me" time with constructing elaborate photo shoots in their bathrooms, taking pics of their least favorite body parts? They don't get enough attention in real life, so they go looking for it on the internet? It's a slippery slope of codependence: digital cameras and people with low self-esteem. I put the occasional photo of myself up on my site, but it's never accompanied by a post about how depressed I am about my ass. I choose to let my words do the talking...and to clarify, I don't think that EVERYONE that puts self-portraits online are full of themselves - I just think there's a line there. A line that too many people willingly cross.

I just don't get it. Somebody please explain this phenomenon to me.