After announcing that she was planning to take a break from social media, Selena Gomez actually managed to gain even more followers — and then proceeded to give everyone a jump scare with her latest post on Instagram. Instead of a Rare Beauty get ready with me, a sincere and frank story time about her mental health, or just a glam shot from a red carpet (or, say, a coat moment), she decided to post the most horrifying image of all: a Tinder-ready shot of herself holding a fish. 

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We all know it: the dating profile fish shot is something that has terrorized an entire generation. Selena leaned into the straight-men-and-their-trophies trope in the shots as she posed with her catch and wore a matching sweatsuit embellished with stars.

"Texas girl at heart. Cali girl for fun and NY gal for the real. Grateful, thankful and blessed lady!" she wrote alongside the carousel of photos.

Back in 2018, The Cut conducted an in-depth investigation as to why so many men insist on showing off their aquatic prizes on dating apps. Respondents shared various reasons, though none really connected to the Selena Gomez of it all: “I think the fish look really nice,” “by comparison, the fish makes me look better looking," and “some of us actually have career ambitions to be fishermen" were just a few of the answers.

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Evolutionary psychologist David Buss explained that it might all come from a deep-seated instinct to project resourcefulness: “Resources obtained by the man’s individual efforts are more highly valued than, say, resources that a man lucked into. This also signals industriousness, a work ethic, and is a good cure to long-term provisioning potential.”

Of course, none of that matters when guys are hoping to, ahem, hook a mate that's just not that into fishing prowess.

“Why do sooooo many dudes post pics of them holding a fish??" one Twitter user wrote before dropping some generational knowledge: "Like that’s supposed to impress me??”

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