'HumbleBraggers,' You Know Who You Are

No one likes a humble show-off: 'Independent' writer
By Neal Colgrass,  Newser Staff
Posted Sep 30, 2011 5:07 PM CDT
Updated Sep 30, 2011 5:24 PM CDT
Humblebragging
Oprah Winfrey is guilty of humblebragging, says one writer.   (AP Photo/Charles Rex Arbogast, file)

"Wow, I can't believe a national newspaper asked little old me to write a big story for it!" gushes Will Dean in the Independent. "Say hello to the humblebrag." For those outside the Twitter universe, "humblebragging" is the act of showing off one's successes in a humble manner. "The worst offenders tend to be celebrities followed by tens of thousands of people on Twitter, who have a lot to brag about" but prefer "not to wantonly show off," writes Dean. Still, he admits that "we're all prone to it."

Dean points out a Twitter account, @humblebrag, that's dedicated to retweeting the biggest humblebraggers around—such as Oprah Winfrey and Tila Tequila. Dean's favorite is a California businessman who whips off doozeys like, "I just realized I've only showered in ONE of my FIVE showers since I've moved in here. This must change." Dean flirts with a serious analysis of humblebragging, placing it in our age of narcissism and entitlement, but concludes simply that "no one likes a show-off. Even a humble one." (More Twitter stories.)

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