Common Habits of the Poor, Chapter One: Cell Phone Self Portraits

   Welcome to Common Habits of the Poor, in which we will discuss why the lower-class and undereducated folk do the silly things that they do. This will be a regularly updated series with a variety of topics, because lord knows they give us plenty of material.
  For today's topic, we will be discussing why, dear god why, poor people insist upon taking photos of themselves in the mirror with their cell phones. If you don't know exactly what I'm talking about, how I envy you.

    So why is it that the poor have such an affinity for cell phone self portraits? Like nearly anything, the reasons are plentiful and no single reason stands out. Here is a list of several of the main reasons that you can count on your news feed being polluted by your old friends from high school (until they dropped out) who now work at the DMV and moonlight as a self-employed cell phone mirror model:

1.  They need attention on a whim. If a normal human being like myself, and maybe even you (but probably not) were to get a new outfit or a funny hat, they'd wear it out that evening and make sure to be included in a classy group photograph with the outfit. Therein lies a conflict with the average poor person. They do not have the patience to sit by and wait and hope someone notices their outfit. Instead, they have to do the internet equivalent of smacking you in the face with it by posting it online with their cell phone in hand in front of a mirror and wait for their friends to comment on the photo on how great they look (in between commenting on other people's statutes about "drama" and other activities for the poor).

2. They lack friends to hang out with. This is not to say poor people do not have friends. Some of them do. Many of them, actually almost all of them, have been friends since they were small children and were all together on the "greatest night of their lives" (the senior prom, when poor people peak in life). The problem is that most of their friends are working long hours, have no money from not working at all, or taking care of their multiple children to do "fancy things" like have their usual redbull and malibu at the local dive bar that was cool 10 years ago. So, when they want a snapshot and feel the need to express themselves, they have no photographer at home other than the trusty Motorola. 

3. All Their Friends Do It.    This likely needs no explanation. People that dropped out of school in the tenth grade are rarely "facebook friends" with aerospace engineers and cardiologists. Furthermore, the poor are always on social media (because they lack a job) so they get bored (again with not having the job) and change their profile pictures as often as humanly possible. So, when they are in the habit of changing the profile pic every time a commercial break interrupts Maury and all they see is a sea of other profile pictures filled with mirrors, cameras, and the occasional topless male, it's not hard to predict that their picture will be following that pattern. 

 
4.  It Turns All the "Ladiez" On!!!          Clearly. Poor people are born to breed. It takes little for them to unbutton their South Pole jeans and hop in the sack with any random asshole that pays them enough attention. They don't even bother to ask you to pull out and aim your load onto their lower-back tattoo of some poorly-translated Japanese word. Whatever you want is fine. So maybe it does turn all the "ladiez" on if you pose shirtless in front of a mirror like the huge asshole that you actually are. Maybe you're right. But when your child support for your eight children is due, realize that you may not be able to afford your cell phone bill and may not be able to post your awesome shirtless pictures for a while.