I started to notice the rise of the @humblebrag recently, but I didn’t realize it had its own Twitter feed:
For instance, after he won his Academy Award for “Toy Story 3,” the director Lee Unkrich tweeted: “Just in case you think all this has gone to my head, within 36 hours of winning the Oscar, I was back home plunging a clogged toilet.” That ended up on Humblebrag.
There’s a “false humility” to these Tweets, said Mr. Wittels, that “allows the offender to boast his ‘achievements’ without any sense of shame or guilt.”
Naturally, committing a humble brag is a particularly Hollywood kind of offense. Many of the people Mr. Wittels re-tweets are known personalities, and now people email to alert him about them from all around the world. But there are also regular civilians who humble brag. A gentleman in San Diego with the handle TotesMcGotes who works in real estate recently tweeted, “I just realized I’ve only showered in ONE of my FIVE showers since I’ve moved in here. This must change.”
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There is the “It’s not a brag because I am just complaining” humble brag. Tila Tequila once tweeted: “I hate my lambo! Police is ALWAYS pulling me over just cuz its a lambo so they always think I’m speeding but I’m not!! Then they let me go!”Then there is the “This isn’t a brag because I am being self-deprecating” humble brag. Nolan Gould, the kid from “Modern Family,” tweeted: “I just had my first screaming girl encounter. She probably had me confused with someone else.”
Really it’s a gut feeling. If I read it and feel this vague sense of annoyance by it, it counts.
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Actor LeVar Burton had my all time favorite. The tweet was “It’s a good night for natural light in LA” and then he posted a picture of his fireplace, but on the mantle above it were like 20 Emmy awards. A masterpiece! He did a follow-up one three days after Christmas where he tweeted “Stockings still hung…” and attached a picture of his family’s stockings all hung on his Emmys. That guy really seems to want us to know he won a bunch of Emmys for “Reading Rainbow.”
You find the same thing on Facebook, of course — fewer celebrities, I suppose, and a lot more references to people’s kids.