Today's cartoon by Mac in the Daily Mail was inspired by the story of the British man whose 'selfie' with EgyptAir hijacker Seif Eldin Mustafa has been widely shared around the world.
BACKGROUND
A British man who was pictured with the accused EgyptAir plane hijacker says he's not sure why he posed for the bizarre photo. Ben Innes, 26, told The Sun newspaper he wanted to take "the selfie of a lifetime" while the hostage ordeal was unfolding at a Cyprus airport. The photo of Innes standing next to the hijacker with what looked like an exposed suicide vest went viral on social media within hours. The vest turned out to be fake and all the plane's passengers and crew were released unharmed Tuesday. Full story >>
CARTOON
A woman is showing some friends or family her holiday photos. In the photo they're looking at, we can see a smiling man and a bear standing side by side with their arms around each other's shoulders. She tells them, "... and this is a selfie my husband took just before the bear tore him to pieces ..."
EXPLANATION
Her husband was killed by the bear right after the photo was taken! The cartoon is a humorous take on the dangerous selfie phenomenon. Believe it or not, there is actually such a thing as a bear selfie, a new craze that involves taking a picture of oneself with a bear in the background. And according to this Sun article, a recent rise in Instagram selfies and YouTube challenges are leading to an increase in accidental death and serious health injuries.
GRAMMAR
Note the two irregular past tenses: 'took' (take, took, taken), and 'tore' (tear, tore, torn).
COMMENT
This story launched a whole debate about whether the photo was actually a selfie or not. Selfie is defined by Oxford Dictionaries as "a photograph that one has taken of oneself, typically with a smartphone or webcam and uploaded to a social media website", while the photo with the hijacker was taken by someone else. However, some have argued that the meaning of 'selfie' has changed, and that it now includes any photos of oneself. I'm sure Kim Kardashian would agree!
ALSO SEE
• Footage emerges of hijacker and British passenger posing for photograph (The Guardian)
• People are furious about calling the hijacked plane photo a 'selfie' (The Independent)
• When is a selfie not a selfie? (The Guardian)
• Has British hijack hostage's selfie landed him in trouble at work? (MailOnline)