Selfies 'should be banned in London public places' says shock survey

Ban: Two-thirds of young Londoners want selfies to be outlawed in public
EPA
Georgia Diebelius24 August 2016

Selfie-loving celebrities like Rihanna, David Beckham and Beyonce are in for a shock after a study revealed two-thirds of young Londoners believe the snaps should be banned in public.

In a poll of 2,000 18 to 24-year-olds, 68 per cent said they had grown sick of “annoying” and “vain” people constantly photographing themselves.

There are growing calls for the capital to extend controls which have already seen the O2 Academy in Brixton, Wimbledon, Wembley and Arsenal’s Emirates stadium clamp down on the trend, now considered more annoying than people stealing sunbeds abroad.

A further 42 per cent admitted to “defriending” people on social media because of the number of selfies they post on holiday, while 37 per cent said they spend at least five minutes a day taking them.

That totals to more than 30 hours a year taking selfies – and 15 per cent of those people also admitted to wearing a full face of make-up on the beach to prepare for any unexpected snaps.

However, it’s not just tourists and Londoners taking the front-facing photographs. In fact, stars including Lily Allen, Niall Horan and Cara Delevingne often share pictures of themselves on television shows and public transport.

Superstar Beyonce also loves to post a snap of herself backstage – which is bound to upset the 84 per cent of people who claimed to dislike selfies.

The figures sparked a campaign by mobile provider, Three, who claim to be aiming to stop tourists taking ‘selfies’ and instead start taking ‘fronties’ – by turning the lens on the outside world.

The campaign was created to celebrate the addition of 24 new destinations to Three’s ‘Feel at Home’ service – which allows people to use their phones abroad without any extra cost from September.

Three spokesman Tom Malleschitz said: “We hope that in line with the feedback from the great British public, people start turning the camera around and taking fronties instead of selfies.”

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in

MORE ABOUT