Look, here I am in front of the Washington Monument. Look, here’s me at the Yankee game. Hey, look at me at the Jersey Shore drinking a Margarita. It’s just become a fact that people are no longer interested in simply taking a picture of a national monument, a baseball cathedral or the ocean. Now, we insist on putting ourselves into every picture, suddenly the photographer is the center of attention.
We can thank our picture narcissism on the whole selfie-rage. Selfie recently beat out Twerk for Oxford word of the year. Taking selfies has become so commonplace that our President is even doing it…at Nelson Mandela’s funeral.
But here’s the thing, animals have yet to get on board with the whole selfie-craze. So when a young man from Maine named Brian Genest was visiting Florida, he went on a walk with his family. During the walk, Genest spotted a squirrel and decided to take a selfie with the creature. Due to the flash or perhaps the sound of the man’s camera, the squirrel panicked and jumped onto Genest’s back.
Genest was not able to pull the rodent off his back. He did drop to the ground, and the squirrel detached itself and ran off into the woods. Neither boy nor squirrel was harmed in the incident. He later said of the atttack, “Right after that I was just flailing around like crazy. He was under my shirt and I could feel his claws, it was a little freaky.”
That’s not the best part of the story, however. His hero mom took a picture of the insane squirrel attack and put the pics online. Since that time, the story and the pictures have gone viral. They are trending on practically every search engine on the web making Genest’s squirrel selfie attack a hilarious cautionary tale.
UNUSUAL: Squirrel goes nuts on teen taking 'selfie' http://t.co/Bgo5AnZc3Y pic.twitter.com/GWcAHKm12z
— FOX 4 NEWS (@FOX4) May 2, 2014
As you can imagine, the Twitter world has had a field day with the attack.
A lesson in trying to take a #Selfie with someone that's not into that kind of thing. http://t.co/Od8gE0RXlb @FM96Rocks #520Tweets
— Sarah Burke (@Burke_FM) April 28, 2014
LoL! These selfie are gettin outta hand @ENews Teen Takes selfie W/ Squirrel, Moments Later Teen Attacked by Squirrel http://t.co/qlFsHwuw0P
— Raqiyah Mays (@RaqiyahMays) May 2, 2014
No pictures! Squirrel pulls a Baldwin on selfie-taking teen: Park-dwelling squirrels and Hollywood celebs have… http://t.co/kORy2GOfGc
— So. Maryland Forums (@somdcomforums) May 2, 2014
Lesson learned? Doubt it.
Image via Brian Genest, Facebook
