Let's put it the simple way - being a photographer assumes owning a camera. But owning a camera doesn't lead to being a photographer unless you try hard enough. And if you like taking pictures, it's not that hard at all.
There is a wide spread phenomenom of people owning DSLRs and using it only on AUTO or other programme modes. There are people taking pretty average or even under average shots putting a huge watermark over it. There are people thinking taking a selfie with a DSLR equals being a photographer, and others thinking it just equals being cool. But there are so many reasons why you shouldn't be bothered by all these facts. People were weird since the beginning of time as we know it. After all a photographer is, by definition, the one who is taking pictures. Professional photographers are another thing, and so are photography enthusiasts.
If taking a selfie with DSLR helps in bringing up someone's self-esteem and/or motivation toward reaching the final goal of ANYTHING, even if the goal is being cool and accepted, then so be it. And if someone really has a dream of being a photographer and has struggles in the beginning, you should know there are two kinds of critics: constructive ones, that are helpfull and made in friendly approach, and cinical/hating/look-at-me-I'm-so-smart-and-direct ones, that sound somehow like this:
"I would take better picture with a potato"
"My grandmother would do better than that and she's half-blind"
"You call yourself a photographer?"
Well, we all know what cinical/hating/look-at-me-I'm-so-smart-and-direct ones means and how it looks in the comments, beacuse almost all of us had an experience of being criticized that way, at least once. Our feelings were hurt, our motivation shatered, our self-esteem lowered, and we had to find out by ourselves what went wrong and what could be done better. The commentator felt a moment of satisfaction and adrenaline rush from perception of domination, and went on.
Negative but constructive critics do make you feelings a bit hurt, because they should do just that, and they do it the right way, they lead you to the way of perfecting yourself and making everything better. You feel a bit down, but you usually respect your commentator for taking time to advise you and explain your mistakes, and deep down, you want to reach that level of your commentator, you want to be even better. Competition is in human nature, and is nothing wrong with that as long as it makes us going forward.
In the end, concentrating on your work and not worrying about what others think they are and are they or aren't they a bad photographers is always the best option. Great pictures attract great audience and acknowledgements. It's that simple.
Author
AOK Photography
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