
List of selfie-related injuries and deaths - CaptainZapp
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_selfie-related_injuries_and_deaths
======
penagwin
While people often write off selfie related things as purely
narcissism/stupidity, I feel like quite a few of these are pretty ordinary and
accidental. For example there's a few about not noticing an incoming flash
flood, or the elephant ones (the herd attacked the man when he exited his
vehicle).

Now some of these are REAL stupid. Climbing on trains, and being near trains
is clearly a common theme.

The injuries with guns are indeed mostly pure narcissism/stupidity. Most of
them were of those "gangsta selfies" where they put a gun to their head to
look cool. Not only did they point a gun to their head, but they had to have
it loaded, chambered, safety off, and finger on the trigger!

~~~
iforgotpassword
That one was a real downer:

 _An 11-year-old Pakistani girl drowned while attempting to take a selfie at
the Kunhar River, which flows through Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province in Pakistan.
The girl 's mother jumped into the fast-moving river to save her but she was
also swept away and drowned. On seeing both his daughter and wife in trouble
the father jumped in; he also drowned. The dead bodies of the mother and her
daughter were found; the father's body was missing. The six-year-old son of
the family was a witness of the tragedy._

Did the parents impulsively jump? Did maybe the dad think for a second that if
he doesn't make it, the 6yo will be an orphan, so it might be better to stay?
Maybe the son was even trying to stop his dad, seeing how his sister and
mother already stood no chance...

~~~
DoreenMichele
_Did the parents impulsively jump?_

There is a phenomenon known as the amygdala hijack. It can cause you to jump
in a river to save a drowning child before you even consciously know what you
are reacting to.

They may not have had time to do any thinking in terms of "But what about my
other child? What happens if we both die?" They may have just reacted in the
moment, not thinking at all, really.

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amygdala_hijack](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amygdala_hijack)

------
cryptozeus
[https://www.selfie-deaths.com/](https://www.selfie-deaths.com/)

Crazy how many train related deaths are there. When I was young, I used to
play around train tracks all the time without my parents knowledge. Back then
there were no smart phones but even then its crazy How stupid that was. Its
astonishing that I have made it out alive. Those things look like they are far
away but you blink and boom they are right next to you.

------
jacquesm
I've coined the term selficide for this.

~~~
verbatim
Presumably most of these are accidental, which makes that an ill-fitting term.

~~~
aeroblop
Why does being accidental in nature make it an ill-fitting term? Suicide is
not the only word to use the -cide suffix: genocide, regicide, homicide,
uxoricide. The -cide suffix regards the act of killing, not of intention or
purpose.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Suicide is defined as intentionally killing oneself.

~~~
jgtrosh
But selficide refers to the -cide suffix, not to suicide.

~~~
mirkonasato
But then again the "self" prefix means doing it to yourself, as in "self-
portrait" (which is where "selfie" comes from): taking a portrait of yourself.

So "selficide" would mean killing yourself, i.e. the same thing as suicide.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
No! It means the selfie killed you? Which would make it correct.

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pro_zac
"A man was discovered with his phone and selfie stick at the bottom of a
100-foot cliff at Long Men waterfall in Zhejiang. Based on photographic
evidence on his phone, local police speculated that he lost his footing while
taking a selfie and fell to his death. It was not known when he died or how
long his body had been there."

If they have photographic evidence from his phone shouldn't they know exactly
how long he had been there?

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octocode
"Five passengers aboard a sightseeing helicopter drowned after a passenger
allegedly tried to take a 'shoe selfie' leading to the passenger's safety
tether getting caught in the emergency fuel shutoff lever."

Man, I'd be so pissed if I died because someone was trying to take a stupid
selfie.

~~~
leaveyou
I bet they were quite pissed off all the way to the morgue too.. but this is
the risk you assume when you hang around with impulsive idiots.

~~~
basilgohar
It may be the case they did not all choose to be together, but were grouped
randomly or in the order they were waiting.

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julianlam
The main thing that popped out for me was seeing the sheer number of gun
related deaths coming out of the US.

Sure, other countries had some as well, but if you scroll by country, it
seemed like every US related one involved a gun.

~~~
mdorazio
If you're taking selfies with a gun, you probably aren't responsible enough to
own a gun. Unfortunately, the same could be said for operating a motor vehicle
based on a number of these incidents.

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technothrasher
"He posed with a gun pointed at his face. The man accidentally shot himself"

There seemed to be quite a few of these. There is no such thing as
accidentally shooting yourself. You can only do so through gross negligence
(or positive intent). It's incredibly simple and easy to 1) Not point a gun at
your face, or anything else you don't want to shoot, 2) check if a gun is
loaded as the first thing you do any time you handle one, and 3) Keep your
damn booger hook off the bang switch.

~~~
ivanbakel
>You can only do so through gross negligence

Which many people would consider to be "an accident". What's the point of this
kind of safer-than-thou pedantry?

Believing "accident" is a term reserved for insignificant things is blame-
culture mentality, and it has been time and time again been proven wrong.
There are big, violent, absent-minded, negligent accidents.

~~~
technothrasher
> What's the point of this kind of safer-than-thou pedantry?

Keeping people from getting hurt and killed? There's a grave responsibility
one takes on when handling firearms. If you take on that responsibility, you
have a duty to protect yourself and others. If you don't want that
responsibility, don't handle firearms.

~~~
ivanbakel
>Keeping people from getting hurt and killed?

It _doesn 't_ keep people from getting hurt and killed. Gun safety does.
Acting as though holding a gun means you cannot make a mistake or have an
accident forbids people from being human, but since it denies reality, it
changes exactly nothing.

~~~
technothrasher
Nonsense. There are three very simple gun safety rules. Forgetting any one of
them is an accident. Forgetting two of them is a serious wake up call.
Forgetting all three of them is not "merely being human"; it is showing
reckless disregard for safety, and it is the only time you'll get hurt.

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dsfyu404ed
Wow, people really like standing in front of and on top of trains. I was
expecting falls from height to be far more common (at least relative to
trains).

~~~
noelwelsh
I suspect messing around a train in much more dangerous than standing on
something high. In statistical terms, the probability of engaging in this
behavior on a train is probably lower, but the conditional probability of
dying is probably much much higher.

~~~
penagwin
I think it's because people understand the danger when they're someplace high
- they know to take better care of where they step, how they move etc.

But I'm guessing people either weren't expecting the trains, or weren't
expecting to be electrocuted by them.

Since the danger was unexpected to the victims it's more likely for them to
succumb to them I would wager?

~~~
agent008t
Could you actually get electrocuted by merely standing on/touching a train
carriage, but not directly touching any live wires/rails?

~~~
penagwin
I'm not a train expert - I'll guess it depends on the train?

Reading through the list, it appears nearly everyone on top of the trains
accidentally touched something live - I'm guessing they didn't realize it was
live or what would happen if they touched it.

------
FatalLogic
related:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19728271](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19728271)
\- Selfie Deaths in the Outdoors (outsideonline.com)

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ctack
While pretty grim, the animal ones are interesting.

~~~
brink
So many deaths by elephants. I guess they're not the gentle giants I thought
they were.

~~~
i80and
Elephants are complex, intelligent, and most importantly VERY LARGE creatures.
In particular (although I doubt it's relevant to selfies), musth can make
bulls quite dangerous no matter the environment or individual.

They're wonderful, but that shouldn't be confused with "harmless".

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lawlessone
why is India so heavily represented by the list? Even for it's large
population it seems very high.

~~~
FatalLogic
It could be biased because Indian stories are more likely to be reported in
English. Wikipedia is more likely to use English sources.

