Be honest. You know you've got one up on Facebook as we speak.
No, No. Don't take it down. You're not alone, my friend.
In bathrooms across America, guys are hiking their shirts up and their shorts down to make their contribution to that most masturbatory of genres in contemporary photography, the one-handed self-portrait.
You know, the incredibly douchey cellphone pic you took of yourself in the mirror as if you "just happened" to have your shirt off? Yeah, that one.
Every guy is consciously aware of how lame and pathetic the one-handed self-portrait makes you look. You talk shit with your buddies about that maybe semi-gay gay dude from college who recently switched his profile pic from a shot of him and his girl to one where he's now the exclusive center of attention. The one-handed self-portrait not only makes a guy look inescapably feminine and vaguely gay, there's also something a bit sad and desperate about it.
And yet we seem unable to resist taking them, even if only in secret. Maybe you stash them in a password-protected folder alongside your startlingly complete collection of cartoon bukkake porn. Or, if you're brave, you bury them deep in your Facebook pics, thinking that no one but an interested lady friend will venture much beyond your vacation or high school yearbook photos (Wrong: your buddies will definitely catch on when they're looking for that candid shot of you doing a beer bong at the company Christmas party).
It's clear that the one-handed self-portrait is no longer just for the overly tanned 'roid heads at your gym or the guys from Jersey Shore. Everybody's got one. Don't be surprised if one shows up as your dad's new profile pic.
There's something sordid and dirty about the one-handed self-portrait. Even if you don't actually post the pics, the very act of capturing this private moment on film reveals a guy's exhibitionist side. It's akin to masturbating in public, and now there's undeniable photographic evidence of it. The one-handed self-portrait is embarrassing, not only because of its effeminate or homosexual undertones, but because it snaps a shot of you quite literally "enjoying yourself."
The masturbation parallels are inescapable. The vast majority of these pics are taken in the privacy of a man's bathroom or bedroom. With the door closed. And if the guy's not trying to overcompensate by staring hard into the camera, he usually has his eyes partly closed with a half-pleasurable, half-disoriented, glazed-over look on his face.
I think the "one-handed" aspect of the cellphone grip should be pretty self-explanatory. Yes, the innuendo of the name "one-handed self-portrait" is deliberate.
If you've ever taken this type of pic yourself (I'm glad you can finally admit it, dude) then you know that you have to take an absolute minimum of 200 shots before you get even one you're satisfied with. But there's something that can be enjoyable in this repetition that is similar to that "other" experience of pleasure that you uh, enjoy with yourself. Even if the next pic is pretty much exactly the same as the last one, we seem unable to resist the allure of the one-handed self-portrait, compulsively drawn back into its welcoming arms over and over and over again. It's there for use just about any time we want it, whenever we can steal five minutes alone behind a locked door.
On the other hand, this repetition also admits of frustration. Like a desperately horny adolescent, you shut the bathroom door to find gratification in solace, and in here there is no place to hide from yourself. If the one-handed self-portrait can be an ego-boost, it can also make a man as insecure as a high school cheerleader with a brownie addiction.
"Do my abs look ok?"
"Which angle makes my arms look biggest?"
"My chest looks good in this one, but ugh, my face looks terrible."
"Do I choose the good face one or the good chest one? How am I supposed to choose??"
The one-handed self-portrait can perhaps be understood as part of the contemporary fad of "men as sex objects," now just as insecure about their bodies and their appearance as women.
But that's not all it is. A guy might want to make himself look good to a woman in the picture, although really that's just a way of looking at himself. Men take these pictures primarily for their own benefit, and there's something sort of strange by also very endearing about that. If the one-handed self-portrait is a bit narcissistic, taking pleasure in one's own masculinity is anything but feminine. It's certainly not anything to be ashamed of either.
So go ahead. Break out the hair gel and the fake Gucci glasses. Put on the one pair of designer underwear you own and sag your jeans a little bit so you can just make out the label in the mirror. Take a pic or 40 of yourself and say, "Shit yes, I'd f*ck me!" You and I both know that bulge in your pants isn't just for the sake of the camera.