Whether you're someone who rolls their eyes back into their head when you see a selfie stick, a LuMee, or anyone making a duck face in public, or you're someone who owns a selfie stick a LuMee, and makes duck faces in public, you're probably quite familiar with the term Selfie.
A photograph that one has taken of oneself, typically one taken with a smartphone or webcam and shared via social media. (Oxford Dictionary)
While there are dozens of different types of selfies out there – and this rule applies to general online content, too – there are typically two get get the most attention online: super hilarious, bizarre, self-deprecating selfies, and smokin' hot, over-the-top, sexy-licious selfies.
Some may argue that posting sexy or provocative selfies on Instagram or Facebook gets you more likes and followers, therefore expanding your clout/the potential to be internet famous/the likes and attention you and your pictures receive.
While sexy selfies can rake in the likes from time-to-time, you can easily attain some online attention with a hilarious selfie or a selfie Boomerang or a selfie GIF – or however else you like to selfie!
Here are a couple of reasons why it may be better to go silly over sexy for selfies!
Full disclaimer:
At the end of the day, you do you. If you're someone who loves taking sexy selfies and posting them: you do you!
To be happy, we must not be too concerned with others. (Albert Camus)
- Yawn. Boring. NEXT.
- Sexy is subjective, funny is 4ever
- Effortless vs. Full o' effort (sexy is just too much work)
- Likes, likes, likes: yikes!
- Why not try both?
Yawn. Boring. NEXT.
Social media is great for a number of things: awesome shots of food, keeping up with your friends and family, checking out local hot-spots for weekend shenanigans, and the inevitable flood of repetitive sexy selfies.
If you're someone who particularly likes to have a feed that's littered with Suicide Girls, aspiring models, boudoir photographers, & cam girls, that's great, but not everyone might be particularly pumped to constantly keep seeing a half-naked gal or guy on their dashboard – especially if that's the only type of photo they take and post over and over and over again.
Sexy selfies can get super boring, basic, and repetitive reaaaally fast, and with the introduction of Snapchat, girls and guys are uploading their shirtless selfies with silly filters thinking that it spices things up and makes things more interesting to look at, when in reality it's just a sexy dog sticking its tongue out at you from behind a filter… #cute? #Sexy?
Sexy is subjective, funny is 4ever
Chances are, at least once in your life, you've come across a photo of someone biting onto their finger, looking lustily into the camera, their legs angled just so, their back arched, their head back, and you just think, "Huh… That's… So awkward…"
Striking a sexy pose for a selfie or making a sexy face – ie, duck face/lips – isn't always super sexy to everyone (and some of you may be yelling, "BUT I DON'T CARE WHAT OTHER PEOPLE THINK!" and hey! That's awesome! But some people do care!). If you don't necessarily know how to angle your body or pose your face, you could end up looking incredibly awkward, uncomfortable, and totally out of your element.
By snapping a hilarious selfie, or even a short video of you trying to be sexy and then giving up and making a slug face, you'll elicit more of a response from your followers online: more comments saying how funny the video was, more likes because people can relate, etc.
Plus, some people might even appreciate your honesty! Not everyone looks like their photos online, and not everyone is walking around at the perfect angle with the perfect filter following them around as they wait for the bus or are getting a cup of coffee.
Effortless vs. Full o' effort (sexy is just too much work)
While some people may argue that a sexy selfie can be simple (you don't need to show your face, you can take a mirror selfie, you can duck lip, etc), it also requires quite a bit of grooming and prep.
Of course, not everyone wears 400 layers of makeup (cough me cough), but if you're someone who is more confident in lipstick and foundation, then gearing up for a selfie might take a couple of minutes of prep.
Then what about lightning?! You obviously need to have the perfect lighting for a super sexy selfie, so you'll spend time hopping from window to window, fiddling with your ring light, closing and tweaking blinds, and taking a bajillion photos at a bajillion different angles to find the perfect selfie that really embodies your true self.
And then editing! You'll have to pull that selfie into Facetune or edit your sexy pout to perfection on Line Camera, making sure all your little bumps and blemishes are hidden. Oh! Then you have to pick the perfect VSCO filter, adjust the contrast, fix the saturation: the list goes on and on.
… Or you could get together with a group of friends, snap a selfie of the three of you making your best squishy faces, laugh your butts off, upload it online, and get back to drinking wine and watching Dateline.
Or, why not combine both and get glammed up, then take silly selfies? You can even edit the pants off of them! At the end of the day, to each their own!
Likes, likes, likes: yikes!
It's no secret or surprise that sexy selfies get a ton of likes on platforms like Instagram, Twitter, or Tumblr. When I had just a couple hundred followers and uploaded a photo of myself on vacation in a bikini, I got close to 200 likes and 40 comments, something that had never happened to me before then.
But here's the thing; the more people that hop on Instagram or Facebook or Twitter, the more chances are that there's going to be a flood of provocative and overdone sex appeal-focused selfies, and because of that, the opportunity to garnish likes and engagement goes waaaaay down.
By switching up the game and uploading some hilarious selfies or Boomerangs, you give people's newsfeed a bit of content that they didn't even know they were missing!
In a world of duck faces and cleavage shots, be the wonky-eyed, scrunch-faced saviour we truly need.
Why not try both?
One of my most popular Instagram Boomerangs is me forcing a friend's face into my chest at a bar as another one of my friend's looks on in pure horror – it broke 1100 views in just a couple of days and 100 likes in an hour or so despite limited hashtags and a private profile at the time. The Boomerang combines both something 'sexy', and also something hilarious, and because of that, it's one of my most popular Instagram posts to date.
You can easily combine being sexy and silly in your selfies, and if anything people will probably appreciate your sense of humor and honesty a bit more if you can go from a duck face to a cross-eyed monster with 30 chins.
Being sexy doesn't limit you to only being sexy in selfies, and being hilarious doesn't only limit you to being hilarious in selfies! Play around and find the best of both worlds when it comes to your photos: after all, it is your feed and you can post whatever the eff you want!
How do you selfie?
Are you someone who loves opening up that front-facing camera, turning on Snapchat, and snapping a few goofy, high-pitched videos and some selfies with a dog-faced filter to share with the world?
Or are you a person who thinks that selfies are A) A big fat millennial waste of time, B) Destroying the fabric of our society because we can't look away from our phones anymore, C) Emphasizing the human race's deep-rooted, overwhelmingly chaotic narcissism? (Didn't expect me to get so deep there, DIDJA?)
Let us know how – or if – you selfie in the comments below!
