Hello and welcome to The English we speak. I'm Feifei.
And I'm Rob. Now Feifei, can you help me with
this social media post I'm trying to write?
I'll try. What do you want to say?
Well, I want to post something about how tired I am
because I've been working so hard and how I just can't go on.
Hmm, it looks like you're looking for sympathy.
Sympathy? No, I just want to tell
people how exhausted I am because
I'm so hard working. You just don't understand.
I completely understand - you are sadfishing.
Sadfishing? I don't even like fish.
No, Rob! You're fishing for sympathy.
When someone is sadfishing they're
exaggerating their emotional problems,
particularly via social media, so they
get sympathy or attention from others.
Hmm, that doesn't sound like me. Right, well
I'm going to send my post now. There, done.
Good luck. Let's hear some examples of sadfishing.
He got lots of likes for his post about
having no friends, but I think he was
sadfishing - he's got loads of mates.
I don't know if Heidi really
has a problem with her skin.
I think she's just sadfishing and wants attention.
Some people say there's a growing trend
for sadfishing and people just share
their worries online to get noticed -
but I wonder if it's a cry for help.
This is The English We Speak from BBC Learning
English and we're talking about the expression sadfishing, which describes
when someone exaggerates their emotional problems particularly on
social media to get sympathy or attention.
It's not a nice thing to do.
So Rob how's your sadfishing going?
It's not sadfishing Feifei, I'm just telling people
about my terrible life so they understand.
Oh and look, I've received a comment already.
Oh, who it's from?
It's from Roy. He says 'stop moaning, I work even harder every
weekend and every evening - but it's OK
because I love my job.'
It looks like he's fishing too.
What sadfishing?
No, fishing for compliments - trying to get
someone to say something good about him.
No, he's just sad - working at the weekends!
Perhaps my life isn't so bad.
Hmm, I think I'll delete my post now.
Good idea, bye Rob.
Bye.