Selfie world record broken at TEDx event in Dublin

The Guinness World Record for the most amount of selfies taken in three minutes was broken on Saturday afternoon at the TEDx Meeting of the Minds event in the Science Gallery, Dublin.

In three minutes, 107 selfies were taken to break the previous record of 105 which was held by wrestler and actor Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson.

The TEDx youth event was held to inspire and motivate young Irish people to share ideas and conversations about issues that are close to their heart.

Food security, social constructionism and overcoming fear were just some of the topics discussed at the event.

The gathering was organised by Future Voices Ireland, which focuses on empowering young people from disadvantaged and marginalised backgrounds to transform their own lives.

Emily Logan, Ireland's first Ombudsman for Children , spoke of how Ireland has a very poor history of hearing our young peoples' voices.

Ms Logan made reference to a four-year-old girl who was bound to a wheelchair and had to be assisted by an adult at all times.

The child’s family applied to her local county council for an electric wheelchair so that she could be independent when she was at school.

Questions were raised about how a young child could manage an electric wheelchair on her own and whether it was a danger to other children in her school.

“All she wanted was autonomy and independence and with her self-determination, she got her electric wheelchair,” Ms Logan said.

Rory O’Carroll, Dublin senior county footballer, spoke about social constructionism and how we, as humans, are responsible for the reality which we construct.

“Homosexuality was constructed as a problem and the action that followed was a criminal one.There is no objective truth, it’s all subjective. Each and every interpretation in unique to you,” he said.

Mairead Healy, chief executive and founder of Young Voices Ireland, said it's about instilling confidence in young people from disadvantaged areas, building their self esteem and helping them to find their voices.

“We want to help young people from disadvantaged backgrounds and put them on a different path in life and the young people involved in this are just incredible,” she said.

“Some of the young people involved have been on government task forces and UN working groups which they wouldn’t have been able to do that before. A lot of them are now going on to college now as well.”