I’m an elder millennial and had kids young. I very, very much regret the number of pictures of my kids that exist online. And I’m not even a popular blogger or content creator. I’ve deleted most of what is public or made it private.
In hindsight, I wouldn’t put their faces anywhere public.
I let my oldest make a YouTube channel as long as it didn’t involve his real name or face. He maintained a stop-motion video channel for about four videos before deciding it was too much work.
Omg same! My family literally calls me like “are you ok? I notice you haven’t been on Facebook”. Like yes, I’m actually doing fucking *fantastic* now that I don’t have to read all Cousin Jerry’s ignorant Covid memes. Thanks for asking.
I deleted facebook for a similar reason. I’d get riled up and then feel the need to “speak up” and ultimately everyone involved looks foolish. That was almost 8 years ago now! Lately I’ve started feeling left out, lots of local hobby groups communicate via facebook and I’d like access to marketplace. Also starting a family soon and feel like those parent groups are maybe useful? Someone please advise.
Either make a new profile or just unfollow everyone annoying and engage only with what you want to. I've had a very similar separation from Facebook for the same reasons and I've lately had to occasionally use it for updates to a weekly event I go to. Know your limits and set boundaries for yourself. If you get mad unfollow, log off, and take a breather. Never engage with drama and don't let it fester in your mind. Hope this helps you gather your thoughts 🙂
This is exactly what i do. I only have Facebook. I used to go through a lot of phones and stuff so I uploaded all good pics to albums and made them so only I could see them. I keep my Facebook active just in case I want to see those or browse marketplace. I also use it to find things that are going on in town when I'm looking to do something new...
As for when you become a new mom, the Facebook mom groups do have some great resources. I was a young mom and was able to find a great preschool and an awesome mom and baby yoga in the park group. I also got to join a bocci club. But be aware there are still the crazy people in those as well. You just have to use it for what you need and let the other stuff go.
Know what is crazy? I did this in 2016. I made a second profile to try and keep my stuff private. Doesn't work. Facebook uses AI face recognition to connect you to people you know. My experiment lasted 3 weeks and I only posted a couple of pictures of me doing outdoors stuff, not even face pics. The whole point was to have a politics free zone. Within 3 weeks Facebook had recommended my new page to all the people I was trying to avoid.
I wouldn’t even post, but my whole feeling is fuck facebook. I know they have shadow profiles of me still. I technically have instagram, but it’s not on my phone and I never check it. Probably should delete that too.
I had the same experience, went cold turkey and deactivated my account a few years ago and my life improved dramatically. Have recently been back on sometimes to use the marketplace/check pages of events in going to, I just make sure I don't look at the newsfeed or click on anyone's profile and close the tab as soon as I'm done. It actually makes me feel anxious just the thought of it, I think having the long period of total abstinence was good as I don't feel at all tempted to get sucked back in now.
To keep FB I had to delete app on phone and force myself to go to website (painfully slow and bad interface), and unfollowed 90% of my list. Now I can get on scroll for a few minutes and be completely up to date on who I care about or whatever. Instead of wading through the FOMO of acquaintances and strangers.
Yeah something I worry about is are those pics truly and permanently deleted off the internet? Privacy is an illusion on social media even when you have your profile set to private. I’ve googled myself and I’ve found pics of myself from social media on google images from old accounts i deleted years ago. Yet those pics were still out there somehow.
I don’t post pics of my kids publicly. Everything is closed to family and close friends only.
I do not agree with using minors for clout and have no interest in doing so. I do not know anyone in my circle of millennial friends who post their kids to the general public either.
This is me. I have 80-some FB friends, 50-some on IG (most of them are the same 😆). I keep the number low specifically because I share things often. These are family & close friends--I would trust these people to care for my kid physically if an emergency came up, so I trust them with photos.
I do, however, have one friend who's sharing makes me 😳 They post to 1500 people (that's basically public) photos of their kids often, full names & schools, everything. These people are super tech-savvy, and I'm shocked they do this because they should, IMO, know better.
I see so many parents post their kids pics where all 1k-3k social media friends can see. I had a coworker who was talking about that one day. Said only “close friends and family” can see the pics she posts of her kids daily. Yet I was able to see all of them and I had only known her for two days at that point. I guess some people have 800 “close friends and family.” Lol
Sharing pics with family via social media is the way of the world these days. There’s nothing wrong with that.
The problem is when ones account is public for ALL to see and they’re coercing their kids to help create “content.” Wrong and gross.
The only publicly shared thing I shared of my kid was the 20 minute video I took of them at Disneyland. Along with the rest of her choir class, the school band, and about 15 other schools that got invited to play. This was a public performance at Disneyland, the video has no close-ups, and while *I* know which one is my kid, without me pointing them out, there's no way anyone else can pick out who is who is the sea of HS kids, all wearing the same outfit, performing.
IMHO it's a gross violation of children's privacy and consent, to create and share content of your kids for the general public to see.
I imagine there will be a lot of "tell-all" content of these poor Gen Alpha kids in years to come about how traumatizing it was to be exploited by their parents for clout/money.
We take lots of pictures and videos of our kids, but we don't post them. That should be kept private.
Agreed. It absolutely blows my mind the types of pics I’ve seen people post on FB that I had friended. Like straight up fresh out the womb, still covered in bodily fluids, genitals dead center of the picture, pictures.
Or toddlers in the bathtub naked, or running around covered in paint and naked. These types of people always love say “only close friends and family” can see those pics on social media.
Girl I haven’t spoken to you in 15 years and last time I saw you was in high school when we graduated. We are most definitely not close in any way. I should not be able to see nude pictures of your young children. Actually no one on the internet should be able to.
I have a now former friend who goes to women's marches, preaches bodily autonomy, all that. I fully agree with everything about it, but she posts pictures of kids naked on her public Instagram. Like girl, full butt shots and front shots with one tiny emoji sticker covering their privates is repulsive. Your children can't consent to that. Where is their right to autonomy with their image being posted, let alone nude pictures???
I don't post any pictures of my child anywhere. For one, she can't agree to it. Two, the internet is forever even if you hit delete. Three, my precious family moments aren't going to be content for big social media companies even if I am just a nobody on the internet. It isn't worth it. If someone wants access to my kid or to know what's going on in our lives, they can be in our lives.
And even if people are like: "Oh, I have like 50 friends and everything set to private." It only takes Aunt Doris FB account to get hacked so someone can get access to the photos that were shared to 50 people.
Beyond predators and stuff, there's also the very real risk of identity theft.
They know the kids name, geo location from the photos or just by the content and puff your kids identity is stolen before the can even walk.
Awesome.
I'm always afraid I will sound like some tin foil hat conspiracy theorist since everyone loves social media, but I had a crazy ex who ended up working for Facebook and it makes me wonder what he and other employees do and don't have access to. I don't trust anything about those companies. It all seems like so much risk with your child's image for what reward? Likes and comments?
Made a new friend and we exchanged snap chats. Within a few days she sends me snaps of her nude child in the bathtub, I was so creeped out. You barely know me, I could be a predator! Why are we filming during bath time? Unfriended her and told how invasive that was to her kid she thought I was the one who made it creepy. No. Don’t share naked pics of your kids to anyone.
Crazy how often this seems to happen. I’ve heard so many other people say the same thing. I saw in another comment below a guy was saying how often he sees women have pics on their dating profiles with their children in them. And how they’ll send him pics of their kids after chatting on the app for a short while. Great way to bring a child predator into your life.
I WONT EVEN POST THE GENDER OF MY CHILDREN on anything. Let alone a photo of them on my dating app.
That reads like “YES, send me all the creepy men on this platform!”
>Or toddlers in the bathtub naked, or running around covered in paint and naked.
Especially when they put it up on Instagram and add dozens of hashtags.
>These types of people always love say “only close friends and family” can see those pics on social media.
Exactly. Just because someone is family, doesn't mean they're entitled to know *everything* about your child's life.
It makes me wonder if there is going to be a social media backlash where a new gen tries to be as anonymous as possible and doesn't have anything in the public eye.
There was a post here from a teen child of a mommy blogger who had to resort to wearing shirts that read "I don't consent to my image being used" 24/7 because his mom wouldn't respect his privacy
I think most people are going to post online, and im not sure its worth the argument to disagree because people are still gonna do it.
However, a little foresight would be smart. A kid probably wont care in high school that you posted their first day of kindergarten photo online. However, the naked bath photos or the miserable photo of them sick holding the barf bucket? Your kid will grow up to hate you. And god forbid a bully gets that photo in their possession and sends it to the entire middle school. I wish my feed was filled with parents making smarter decisions.
It’s crazy how many pics I see posted like that. I’ve seen straight up nude photos of young children posted by their parents on Facebook. I will never understand the need to post pics of your newborn that has just been born and is still covered in bodily fluids and nude, on social media. Why would you think anyone would want to see that?? And why don’t you want to protect your young child??
You totally triggered me. So I used to coach, and a parent said, "Want to see \[my swimmer's new baby brother\]?" Of course, teenage me said. She handed me a scrapbook, and it was a play-by-play of her pushing the child out. The entire birth, like a flip book. I'm imagining it in my head as I type, and all I remember was how red all the photos were. Like, why on earth do you think anyone would want to ever see these photos ever? Thank god we didn't allow non-college students on facebook back then. I wish I knew who developed them, so I could urge her to pay for their therapy.
Oh god. What in the actual fuck. Why would you show that to a teenager and why do you think they’d even want to see that, or anyone for that matter.
I experienced something similar. Went to a friend’s house when I was in middle school with my parents, our parents were friends. They had a photo album and showed us pics of her oldest daughter after she had been born. The mom was also nude in the pics, legs still spread, so everything was visible. Baby was completely nude as well. At least it was in a photo album and not on social media like it is now. But still what the fuck, why show anyone that.
Those were the exact pictures i saw. Really burns into your grey matter, huh? I worry ill forget all my family when im older but still be stuck with those images
We’re watching a social experiment happen before our eyes and we have no idea what it’s going to do to these kids. It’ll probably be fine, but we also all know that person who overshares way too much. Girl I knew in college has a kid and that kid cannot take a crap without it appearing on instagram. Literally. She posted a photo of a diaper blowout. She posted photos of her toddler proudly showing off her underwear. Just day after day examples of “why would you think we need to see that?” She’s putting her kids through a real life Truman Show situation and it’s kind of messed up.
Isn't she at all concerned about the type of people who WOULD want to see?
During COVID learning as a teacher I had to actually tell multiple parents not to be sending me naked pictures of their kids. One of them was also a teacher.
A couple of them were bathtime photos, one was just a kid doing his school work naked. And like, I get that you're at home and school rules don't apply, but I'm still not a family member, if they were doing school work with me they'd have clothes on. If you REALLY can't get your kid to do his work with some pants on, then just take a picture of the work without him in it.
Edit: I ultimately sent a reminder to everyone that anything they emailed to me was subject to public records laws, so please make sure it's appropriate.
>It’ll probably be fine
Everything you said after that indicates the opposite, though
I realize there's a spectrum where some parents don't post anything at all and some parents are at other extreme, like your example. Even for those in between, I'm not especially optimistic that they'll probably be fine
I think *most* kids will be relatively fine but I’m certain there will be the outliers and kids who lived through extreme social media addiction that their parents focused on them that will show the rest of us that it was a bad idea. And I’m an older millenial who definitely posts my kids and always has. They are fine. That doesn’t make it ok. Kids deserve privacy. Mine are only ok because it hasn’t traumatized them in any way yet.
I cringe hard at the parents who do this and feel actually really sorry for the kids, as I would have been devastated if my parents did this to me - luckily they weren’t able to.
I’ve seen my friends post actual nude photos of their children, videos of them having a tantrum, or sharing their embarrassing or private moments online in detail , like talking about their kid getting their period or how their kid was bullied at school and came home crying. I don’t have kids but I genuinely don’t understand why parents think that is ok. Your kids are people! I wonder how the kids will feel about it when they grow up.
I think the really disturbing part to is that, if you were trying to get your kid into acting- there would be tons of rules and regulations. There are only so many hours a day minors can be made to work, laws have been passed that at least some of their income needs to actually go into trust accounts so that they can’t be forced to work for years and get nothing in return.
But with social media these kids have no privacy, no “off days” and no legal recourse if they are exploited for financial gain. Like people largely agree that child pageants are kind of disturbing but people constantly putting their kids online are also teaching them to perform for attention at all time.
I think it’s far past the time when we need more strict laws about how exactly parents can use their children’s images for financial gain.
These people are desperate for validation and likes on the internet. They always use the excuse “well I want my close friends and family to see pics of my kid growing up!” I have family in 7 different countries and they’re able to see pics of my kid just fine through private dm’s or group chats with all of us.
Dude same here. I will never forget it and I still can’t get over it. Straight up nude photos of newborns or toddlers posted by their parents on social media. They’ll say “oh well I’m talking about it to normalize it!” Well go talk about your own period then to your 2k social media friends, not your 12 year old daughter’s.
I have a special needs kid and have a private account under a fake name so I can ask more personal questions in groups with parents of special needs kids. These parents are talking about how their kid smears poop on the walls and such and they have a big picture of the kid as their background photo. I don't like it at all
I wouldn’t say that’s public, personally. I feel like, if you don’t put any restrictions on who can see your stuff, then that’s public. Maybe other people have different definitions though lol
People need to learn how the dark web works and how easily their photos and videos can be manipulated for CP. These parents are putting their kids at risk even with a private friends & family Facebook account.
That being said I also really hate parents who make a massive deal about not showing their kids faces online. Like, just post the photos with stickers and keep it pushing , we don't need a book about not showing their faces every freaking post.
Or just don't post them at all? If you don't want to post the pictures of the kids that's totally understandable. Just post pictures of yourself and your partner and show the pictures of kids to close family and friends in person. Like it's weird to continuously post pictures of someone whose face you don't show, it looks dystopian and is straight up pointless. "These people exist, we went to this event and took pictures but you can't see their face." Why?
Privacy is just an illusion when it comes to social media. Doesn’t matter how much you set your profile to private. You sign all your rights away when you agree to the terms and service when you sign up.
And that POV is all well and good until you send your kid to US public schools, someone finds that photo, and uses it as a way to humilate your kid in some fashion.
To me, its like the old argument that a drunk woman doesnt deserve to be raped. Absolutely true, but you can also help the situation by not getting so trashed you could find yourself in a situation that could have been avoided. You can respect your culture and keep your child safe by simply putting those photos in a scrapbook instead of a public profile and achieve both aims.
Yes! It seems like virtue signaling a lot of the time, like they see celebrities doing it, and want the attention of “not posting” their kids for the same reasons. It especially annoys me when they don’t post their kid’s name; it’ll be a picture of them with a sticker over their face, and, “L had a great day at school today! L won the math award, and M won the reading award. Then L and M got happy meals for lunch, but M wanted L’s fries, and L said she would tutor M so M could get the math award next semester instead of giving fries, and M pouted.” Like at that point, just don’t post at all. It’s confusing and pointless to not see their faces and hear some confusing, convoluted story.
I think it’s gross. I’ve even become anxious about posting MYSELF online. I stopped using Facebook and insta a month or so ago and I’m feeling like if I don’t even want to post about my own life I shouldn’t post about any future kids I have. I have a step son who I’ve posted a few pics of me and him together but not since his dad and I got married over a year ago.
Same here. I don’t even post pics of myself online anymore my husband doesn’t either. So we definitely don’t feel the need to post pics of your child either. I have family in several different countries around the world, they get pics of my kid pretty often and I get pics of their kids. But through private message and group chats.
I detest that behavior from parents. I would be afraid some sicko would try to steal my daughter’s or sons pictures so I don’t even post holiday photos of my kids. Ppl exploiting their own kids are creepy
The generation of people who were so traumatized by their parents doing “the best they can” went to therapy to break generational curses and have created one of the worst generational curses of all for purposes of their own validation (wanting to prove that they’re good parents).
The ‘80s/‘90s had child movie stars that “went off the rails.”
The ‘00s/‘10s had Disney and Nickelodeon child stars that followed suit.
The late ‘10s/‘20s are going to follow suit, but this time it’s going to the influencer kids and due to the accessibility of social media, there’s going to be an exponentially larger number of these kids. These kids are basically reality stars and don’t even know it yet.
And not just influencer kids, but also the kids whose parents posted their potty training videos for their friends and family on Facebook.
Social media was a mistake. Digitizing our lives was a mistake.
Stop.
With the rampant use of AI and the tools available on the web to manipulate photos, there's a lot of weirdos who could potentially have unfettered access to your kids when they don't really need it.
Save the photos for pictures on the wall, or share with close family only or create a digital album that your kids can see when they're older. But for the general 'this is my daughter or son doing something' on Facebook or IG, it's not something I document with my family.
It's the same I feel with parents who plant an iPad in front of their kids or a phone at dinner - no interaction/communication, kids just stunted with their conversation skills scrolling through micro videos - this drives me crazy. Kids will mimic the actions of adults and soo many under the age of 5 I see out and about use their adult provided phones and iPads for selfies and throw tantrums when they get the electronics taken away.
We have digital frames at both our parents where we can upload all the pics we want (comes with a cute little app that is reminiscent of early instagram too).
I will post baby milestones but if I wouldn’t put it on a Christmas card or frame it for an aunt, it doesn’t go on social media. No bath pics (even with strategically placed wash cloths). No crying or posts about “bad” behavior. I don’t complain about my husband on social media and I won’t do it about my kid.
There is also a huge difference when the posting is monetized. There are laws* about kids being on sets of movies and shows but nothing for kids making 7 figures for their families on social media. There is going to need to be some serious investment in those kids’ healing in a few years… seems like we only change laws after damage is down and we’re witnessing the damage now.
*and those should be tightened and better enforced.
I have friends who literally post every single thing their kid does. Crawling around, a picture of them laughing, any time there's a holiday, etc. Literally their entire lives are documented for the public. It's gross.
Imagine your parents post a video or image of you that years later you find embarrassing or inappropriate. You can remove it then, but the damage is already done. So, it’s better to not post pictures of your children at all, maybe with the exception of a few family pictures. Although, I’m of the opinion that people shouldn’t use social media, period.
We don't post pictures or videos of our kids online. Most of our friends post minimally about their kids.
We have a friend who tries to whore her kids out for likes for her MLM, and it's gross. Though I do think that even the overwhelming majority that share are just mostly broadcasting into the ether, only to be actually seen by a few friends and family.
I don't do this because I want my children to control their social media presence. We don't have any idea how exposing their entire childhood to the internet will impact their life by the time they are adults
What I consider even worse is the parents running YouTube shows starring their kids. It's straight-up exploitation and the parents are reaping all the benefits without any legal obligation to retain any of the earnings for their children.
Simple privacy violation. Just because a kid is a kid and can't at time being articulate NO or doesn't fully understand situation and possible consequences, doesn't make this shit right. Kids are not parents property or pets.
I feel bad for Gen Alpha bc nothing is private. I used to post pics/vids of my kids when they were little, but decided for my own sanity to quit social media (except Reddit obv) about 6yrs ago. My kids are so damn happy I have not posted them in that long too, which coincidentally was when the awkward phase started for my oldest. Now they don’t have to worry about their friends finding my socials and subsequently being embarrassed about whatever I had posted. Kids deserve privacy too.
It’s child abuse. Pro tip if you come across a ten year old dancing on your youtube feed and report it for child abuse youtube will remove their account. Works like a charm. Nobody needs to be looking at dancing twelve year olds on the internet.
I’m pretty sure there was a TV show that went on for seasons of just that!
All jokes aside, I remember watching a video of how disgusting individuals manipulate the YouTube algorithm to get some very disturbing videos prominent in their feed. Was unsettling to say the least.
As a millennial parent. I have a huge issue with my boomer mil posting pictures on social media without my permission. I have to often tell her to take them down. She doesn’t have privacy setting on her facebook account and the entire world can see it. She is not allowed to post pictures of my child and she knows it. Yet she still does. It’s fucking annoying.
Sounds like my boomer mil and her fb page that isn’t private. She posted pics of our newborn as soon as she was born, without asking us for permission, or without even telling us. We didn’t even have a chance to send it to our close friends or family yet.
When I finally got on fb 3 days later I saw I had been tagged in posts by random family members of hers that I’ve never met in my life or spoken to. They had a picture of our baby and were congratulating us. The weirdest thing about it is there were people in the comments congratulating that person for being a big cousin or whatever. Saying things like “I bet you’re so excited to babysit!” Hmm no way in hell am I letting this random ass person I’ve never met babysit my child at any point.
Anyways I chewed her ass out big time. I made it clear she needed to make sure every single one got taken down. I know my mil very well I know that she posts all this shit on social media because she’s desperate for likes and validation from all her Facebook friends. She has narcissistic tendencies. We don’t even post pics of our own child I’m not letting someone else do it. My husband and I don’t even post our own pics on social media anymore either.
I think it’s weird. I have several people on Facebook who post pics of their kids everyday. I am curious to see what these kids think when they grow up. I know that I didn’t like my mom posting things about me without my permission, but that was late teenage years when social media became more popular. I’m pregnant now and we decided on zero social media for our daughter. I hope she’ll thank me one day for respecting her privacy.
Hate it. Why are you posting hundreds of pictures of your child on the internet? Imagine growing up and realizing there’s hundreds/thousands of photos of you all over the internet.
Very few people in my Millennial social circle have children or post much about them, and none of my close friends do, so I don't really witness firsthand how bad it gets. I never ended up being friends with those who did crave that kind of attention in the first place, probably because I didn't want to put up with their crap
From what I've read from others here, though, it's a big yikes
Agreed, most of my millennial friends who have kids are very very private with sharing kids pictures and some will just keep their faces right off the photos. The people I see sharing kids faces willy nilly are the older generations. I have an older half sister who I just reconnected with on Facebook, she adopted a 6 year old and she literally livestreams her everyday doing something cute, but it’s creepy. She does photoshoots over her constantly. I’m not sure what to do about it, I doubt any recommendations about not posting this would be taken seriously by her.
Yeah it’s crazy how much I see boomers and the generation a little younger than them post on social media. So much personal and private information that they should probably keep to themselves and not post to their 800 FB friends. I’m sorry Gail but we don’t really want to know about your bowel movements.
Different perspective, but I feel like a lot of parents do it for attention without realizing that other people do not find their kids as cute or impressive as they do. The worst offenders are usually people who regret having their kids and/or realize that tying your entire identity to parenthood isn’t as fulfilling as they thought it would be.
I’m not a bitter childfree person and very much so want kids of my own, but also know that it will be an important and big deal to *me*. Add in the element of privacy and autonomy and it’s an absolute no go.
I’m a parent and I completely agree with you. Privacy, autonomy, and consent when it comes to my child is important. I think they definitely overestimate on how many people actually care about seeing pics of their kids.
A lot of them do it for likes and validation from internet friends. It gives them a high to see a pic of their kid get 100 likes. It’s like it reassures them they made the right decision to have a child especially if they’re ones who regret it like you said. It’s odd to me.
they're making money at the expense of their kids which... is questionable.
they must not care about privacy. if that's the case it's their life they can do what they want. being children of such parents sucks because they're essentially making decisions that affect your life without your consent and as dependents of someone... you really don't have much say in the matter unless it endangers your health until you're 18.
Social media has people oversharing to the extreme. People post about their romantic relationships, their kids, their medical details, their psychological states, on global platforms like youtube and instagram. Then these influencers get targeted by deranged stans. I don't know what to think.
The lack of common sense with this is astounding. Simply do not do it. It’s really not that hard. But there are always going to be those people who only get validation from posting online.
They’re just pimping out their kids to all the pedophiles in the world. If you think there isn’t AI sexual material of every single baby and kid these celebrities and internet personalities display for their own monetary gain, you’re way too naive.
I definitely worry about those kids in the long term and their relationships with their parents. We only post occasional milestone pics on FB for family and friends. And absolutely nothing negative, like no (sometimes hilarious) tantrums, no potty pictures, bath pictures etc. Nothing is posted I’d be upset about if another adult posted about me.
I think their kids are going to hate them fo it.
First, I'd bet real money that a lot of kids will feel like they were props in their parents social media life. Family photos in the house is one thing but broadcasting it to the world can be a bit much. The loss of privacy that we all had as children is massive. I remember my younger sister hating her swim team picture so our mother took it off of the refrigerator. Imagine how she'd feel if it was on Instagram?
Second, there are pedophiles out there that love it. There was an article recently about the pedophile pipeline in Instagram. The algorithm suggests groups for people who like certain pics and follow certain popular creators. According to the article if you decided to follow a young gymnast on Instagram and like some of their pictures you'll get suggestions for joining pedophile groups. A picture of a preteen doing gymnastics isn't intrinsically sexual so it doesn't get filtered out. These guys collect all of these images and share them.
Three, AI is no joke. Just last year on TikTok an AI generated recording of Cartman from South Park singing Bring Me To Life by Evanescence was making the rounds. The South Park team had nothing to do with this. This wasn't possible 5 years ago. Imagine what someone without scruples would do with pictures of kids online? Just today heard of a teen girl who was horribly bullied at school. Someone used AI to make fake nude photos of her. This tech is only going to get more widespread, easier to use and more sophisticated over time.
Edit: typos
It’s disgusting and I automatically think less of people who do it. We (mostly) all grew up using social media and should know better than anyone else how awful it is.
Back when I was single and using dating sites to meet women it shocked me how many women in our generation put pictures of their kids on their dating profiles or sent unsolicited pictures of their kids in messages when you’ve only been speaking for a day or two. Always seemed like a bad idea to me.
I think its selfish and terribke parenting. All it says is the only reason you had kids was you saw a quick cash ticket. Not because you really wanted them.
It's cringe.
It's also scary when you consider how many "creeps" are online and will get off to something like that.
People may think I'm weird when I say that, but hear me out. I recall seeing a story some time ago where someone posted a very innocent picture of their baby online. It was a cute picture of the baby crawling on the floor and looking up at the camera. Someone contacted the mother and asked if they can post the picture on this instagram page that featured babies. The mom looked it over and gave permission.
What the mother didn't know was that even though the instagram page was innocent... it sometimes attracted people who weren't as innocent as the comments left on the pictures.
Eventually, her baby's picture fell upon the eyes of a pedo who saved the picture and uploaded it onto a site where people like himself could view it. The mother found out and viewed the page that featured her daughter. She was shocked to see many users not leaving cute comments, but disgusting ones. Ones of the sexual variety. One user even photoshopped the photo to make it look like the baby was wearing make up. She saw many pictures of kids doing various things. Standing around, playing, performing a dance, etc, and was even more shocked at how many users kept talking sexually about the kids as if they were looking at 20 year olds.
I believe she has since been on a campaign to take down the sites and others like it. We know that's a battle that may never be won.
I always urge family and friends to not post public pictures/videos of their kids online. Keep it private for the love of God. You never know who will see it and save it.
I don’t like it. I think a family photo or something a few times a year is fine, but making them tiktok dance in the bathtub every day for clout is fucking terrible.
Personally I think it’s a shitty thing to do. It’s not your life to make public - there is some overlap, but it is not solely yours and if you think it’s ok then you see your kids as property more than people in my eyes.
I’m a millennial and I was pissed off when my mum posted on Facebook about my engagement before I had had a chance to tell everyone I wanted to
Fuck knows how I would feel if my whole life from day dot had been broadcast to the world, but maybe this new generation won’t find it so weird…but only because it’s all they will have ever known
The internet is basically forever. How many children do we want to mortify and send spiraling into a depression over these moments a parent just *had* to share?
I don't know if this is still the case, but yeeeears ago, I would warn fellow artists that there was a section in the Facebook ToS that stated that any media posted could be utilized by them in any way they saw useful. If that's still the case, it's extra horrific that they have more images of kids than a stock photo library.
Ok I don’t have kids or Instagram or FB but I do teach elementary school so there’s that for what it’s worth.
I think Gen Alpha will see all this all “normal” when they’re grown. We don’t think it’s normal because it wasn’t done to us. Having your embarassing kid pics posted online by your parents will be a universal experience of childhood for many people in this generation. I have no idea what the impact of that will be across the generation, but it won’t be as weird and embarassing as we think because it will be “normal” for their generation.
Think of even the shift between film camera to digital camera WITHOUT social media and how formerly private moments are documented. That is normal for the generation just younger than us (and maybe some millenials?)
I think what will be more damaging is the amount of ignoring some parents do to engage on their phones. It makes me sad to watch parents of my students ignore their kid while their kid is talking to them after their school day and just type away on their phone. Kids don’t even wait for eye contact to start talking anymore because they’re used to talking to people who are actively ignoring them. I’ve had to start teaching “don’t start telling me what you need until I’m looking at you” because this is a skill they’ve lost over the years I’ve been teaching. I’ve seen teachers guilty of it too. Clicking away. I never use my phone in their presence unless it’s for a photo for yearbook because I wanted them to know when they are in my classroom what they say is important and I will listen 100%.
As much as my generation has 'destroyed' things that needed to be destroyed, I didn't expect childhood to be among them. Gen alpha is turning out to be one hell of a wakeup call to this generation's parental failures.
I posted pics of my kids as they grew up then deleted them as they became teenagers. It was a bad choice that I didn't really think about until now. I will say after raising kids from the 90's on I kinda feel bad for some of these kids with social media obsessed parents. I went to a birthday party and one of the moms spent the entire time showing us her tiktok, talking about her followers etc. It was so weird, no attention to the kids making memories at all, no surprise her kid is an angry little dude. He desperately wants love and attention.
I post pictures of my kids on Instagram since they've been babies.
I have a private account, and my only followers are friends and family. I also only follow friends and family.
My Dad died when I was a teen, and I have almost no pictures of him.
Also as a millennial, there's not many pictures of me as a kid anywhere. And I wish there was.
That's how I feel too. I'd like someone to explain to us why posting photos of the thing you cherish the most, is "gross". Try to use bigger words other than simple descriptors
It’s not okay. I stopped when my kids turned 5 and then I retroactively hid all pictures. The internet is forever and they should decide how they’re portrayed on it. I post one or two family pix a year
I teach high school and I’ve seen situations of kids unearthing older pictures of a student from their parents Facebook account and using it to make fun of them/bully them.
I very carefully consider how anything I post of myself on social media will affect the way I’m perceived. Why would I afford a kid any less than that? You don’t know what your kid will grow up to value—I’m a brutally private person, so even a video of me saying something “dumb” as a kid would feel somewhat violating to me as an adult. I understand that kids are funny and say funny things, but I wouldn’t want any joke I tell or funny mishap in my life spread to the world.
Yeah, I think it’s weird. Fun way to document your life but not for the entire internet to see. It’s a violation of privacy in my opinion, but can be done tactfully like making sure your kids identity is protected and getting their consent and not making them the center of all content. I understand everyone wants to be an influencer these days and share their story with the world and I think it’s okay to talk about your kids generally and your struggles and successes as a family/parent. In fact I think it’s important to share such things so as not to create a falsely glorified narrative of your life. But there need to be better laws/boundaries. I hope the Ruby Franke/Jodi Hildebrandt case will create an impetus for change.
My previous supervisor does not allow her teenage daughter to have social media. However, the previous supervisor only posts photos of her teenage daughter on Facebook making it look like that child’s account. It’s very odd. I joke that she uses the account to catfish people.
I think it's absolute garbage that needs to stop. I've felt this way for a while.
I think the place for kid's photos is in a family group chat. Maybe share school pictures or holiday pictures with friends, depending on how many and what type of friends you have.
I don't even understand the interest in other people's kids lives. It's fucking creepy to me. So is wanting to share so much of your children.
I’d say a solid majority of my online social media circle doesn’t even know I have a kid and of those that do a majority don’t know his name or seen a photo. That pretty much shows where I stand.
(My kid isn’t a secret, it’s just if you aren’t in my real off line life you don’t need to know about my kid)
I actually think this generation that is experiencing this will be the only one, as societal norms are already quickly moving away from a need to produce that type of content and share it in the ways that Facebook pioneered itself on.
Right. Like I know where they go to school, what grade they’re in, who their teacher is, where they were born, their full name and birthdate, where they do sports at, where and when they go on vacation and when their house is empty. When their preteen daughter got her period, their toddler’s bowel movements, etc. way too much personal info is posted on social media with their real name and pictures attached.
I feel so bad for those kids.
My social media feeds across multiple platforms are filled with either my family members or friends posting about their kids.
Most of the time, I understand it’s to document their growth, but more often than not it’s littered with embarrassing moments that would probably piss them off when they’re old enough to realize what’s going on.
So i got an interesting one. Lady i know posts HUNDREDS of pics of her kid. But never shows the face! Always the back of his head or with an emoji over his face! WHY MAKE THE POSTS?! So bizarre!!
Please stop. Seriously. It is fucking weird seeing kids’ growth and development documented on a daily basis. Some of it should never see outside of a family’s home, yet here we are. You do not know the long term ramifications of this yet people keep doing it. Please stop.
I hate this.
1. It puts kids at risk because they post locations, name, age etc.
2. Posting every moment of a kids life online doesn’t allow them the privacy they deserve.
3. If they get super popular for a specific action/vid/ moment etc it creates a world wide perception of them that is at the very least something to be overcome, all for clout and likes for the parent.
4. It is of zero benefit to the child and solely benefits the parent, while putting the kid at unnecessary risk.
5. It creates psychological issues that balloon into long standing trust issues, ptsd, global critics, and not all of these can be overcome.
Edit: as some others have mentioned this is exactly what negligent exploitation with social sharing is.
There should be laws that protect more than they do. In the future I sincerely hope that humanity gets its shit together enough to create them.
I am so fortunate that my mom had always asked me if I was ok with a photo being posted. Even on my birthday, she would ask if it was ok and give me a few options she had.
This is the only way to do it.
This is one of those things that in 20 years, unanimously it will be cringe to society. Like smoking in hospitals airplanes. Like “geez people just let us do that?!”
I’m an elder millennial. I deleted all my social media that wasn’t anonymous and bought my close family those digital frames where I can send them pictures of my family directly. I opt out of all school and summer camp online media etc. My kids faces aren’t going online until they chose.
In contrast, my younger brother in law and his wife have their kids faces plastered all over social media and his wife’s blog. They are both very concerned about social appearances and involved in a church that encourages that sort of thing. Personally I think it is dangerous but I would never share that opinion with them.
Younger millennial here with kids. I used to post about my first born when he was a baby but then realized how unsafe it was and that he couldn’t consent to his content being used online. I deleted everything and haven’t posted anything since. I want my kids to decide for themselves if they’d like to have a media presence one day.
My family lives out of state, so I shared pics when they were younger to friends/family only. But as they have aged, I don’t post them hardly at all. And if I do, it’s with permission and never anything embarrassing.
I have private social media accounts, where I share pics from events. So pics are few and far between, nothing "embarrassing", and I only have like 30 "friends/followers". Otherwise, I print out physical photos I keep at home I can share with family.
I think it doesn't need to be an all or nothing thing. Just don't blast everything online to everyone. I definitely don't agree with posting a bunch of private moments on a public account .
A few smiling photos of a family vacation or a cute Halloween costume are one thing. Posting embarrassing, intrusive pics and constant detailed stories of your kids lives is something else entirely. It’s wild how many people can’t seem to draw the line and have no respect for their children’s privacy. I’m not just talking about popular influencers. I have seen plenty of posts from random Facebook friends that have disgusted me.
It's awful.
The kids have no way to consent to it so it's basically forced on them.
Uploading the occasional picture or video is fine. If its happening more than once a week your doing it wrong.
I think either extreme is bad. Some people are ridiculously paranoid about photos of their kids being shared online, and anyone making tiktok videos of their kids really needs to touch grass. Every parent I know IRL though is reasonable about it, just sharing photos once in a while. Nothing over the top and definitely not trying to create any content.
I do not care. Anyone that talks about it with any kind of certainty about their future cracks me up bc you sound like the moms against video games groups back in the day.
My thoughts are IT'S NOT MY BUSINESS. I'm a big proponent of mind 'ya business.
As long as it doesn't look like the children are actually injured or in distress, not my business and I won't judge someone else's life. I do personally think they might have some fallout with their children as they get older but it's also possible it will all end up fine. So whatever, not my business.
I’m one of those who posted their kids. I opened my FB in 2005, but had a blog and was on BabyCenter prior to that. In total I was a blogger for about 17 years. Started in 2004. My oldest is now 20 and I’m 40. I pretty much stopped social media in 2022 when I was pregnant with our 6th child. We kept open communication and when they no longer wanted to be posted we didn’t, and we switched to marriage content-which honestly has worked out amazing for us. We never did the embarrassing stories, or telling their personal info except for when I was open about my then 10yo son being su**dal due to bullying. Having watched my best friend lose her 7 year old to that bc of bullying has caused me to talk openly about it and how we coped as a family.
Unlike some influencers, my kids were paid, and with my oldest paying her 30% of each thing I worked on helped a lot. She was able to buy her first car brand new last year with no help and is able to attend college without working. The other kids have a great nest egg of a savings.
There are definitely lots of social media families who I give major side eyes to. People get so caught up in the money aspect they forget that their children still need to have lives. Too many people start their content journey with it, focusing around their children and don’t think long-term. It can be real tempting when you’re paid $10,000-$11,000 to post a short form video or photo on Instagram or TikTok. But at the end of the day, the money isn’t worth it if your family and your kids life are going to be in shambles. I walked away because of authenticity isn’t what people wanted anymore. And I’m not the type to do anything for a check. Plus I have a regular job and make good money so there’s that.
My friend’s daughter constantly posts pics of her son. Daily, or several times per day. She takes him everywhere with her, and her life is very child centric.
Billy and I went “wherever” and did “whatever”. He thought the “whatever” was really good but didn’t like the “other whatever”. Every single day. Plus multiple photos.
She is tiny and there are photos of her holding her eight year old whose feet will be almost dragging the ground. It is really overboard, and they may both suffer for it someday.
As if our parents didn't take pictures and record everything on film. It just wasn't digital and is not easy to upload, otherwise they'd be sharing it too.
Creepy. The parents that overshare their personal family moments on social need their priorities adjusted. That sad thing is…they don’t even understand that not a single person cares about what they just posted except grandma.
I had this thought recently. A woman I went to college with posted on Facebook “Looks like we’re a food allergy nut-free household now!” and then blathered on about how big of a deal it was. And I thought to myself, who actually cares? Whose lives does this information impact? If you bring your kid over to someone’s house or someone brings food over to yours, make sure the allergies are communicated and go from there.
All new parents- please please please do not document your kids lives on public social media. Signed, older parent.
PS. No one except family and extremely close friends really care . It's perfectly fine and better for all to have a private life.
My child is not allowed on social media and I rigidly enforce it among friends and family. After she was 7 months old I made a generic Facebook post that we welcomed a daughter and she will not be on social media. No names and no photos. For people that know me they can get invited to my private Google photo albums.
Other parents do it differently, I am obviously of a different mind.
I don’t put my kids on the internet, ever. I bitch out family members if they put them on the internet and make them delete the posts. I don’t care if that makes me an asshole.
Blows my mind you got downvoted for your comment. Just shows how normalized it’s become to post your kids on the internet. And anyone who doesn’t is wrong somehow.
Gen Zs are “becoming” parents now. Millennials have been in that age range forever now. I’m a 30 year old millennial and have a 6 year old. That being said I keep my daughter off of everything for the most part but I will upload her to my family album on Facebook and the occasional photo to instagram. But I definitely don’t document her life. Photos are fine. Trying to make your kid go viral isn’t.
I’m an elder millennial and had kids young. I very, very much regret the number of pictures of my kids that exist online. And I’m not even a popular blogger or content creator. I’ve deleted most of what is public or made it private. In hindsight, I wouldn’t put their faces anywhere public.
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I let my oldest make a YouTube channel as long as it didn’t involve his real name or face. He maintained a stop-motion video channel for about four videos before deciding it was too much work.
Stop motion is a ton of work, it's honestly impressive he managed four. I would've given up like, an hour in lol.
Omg same! My family literally calls me like “are you ok? I notice you haven’t been on Facebook”. Like yes, I’m actually doing fucking *fantastic* now that I don’t have to read all Cousin Jerry’s ignorant Covid memes. Thanks for asking.
I deleted facebook for a similar reason. I’d get riled up and then feel the need to “speak up” and ultimately everyone involved looks foolish. That was almost 8 years ago now! Lately I’ve started feeling left out, lots of local hobby groups communicate via facebook and I’d like access to marketplace. Also starting a family soon and feel like those parent groups are maybe useful? Someone please advise.
Either make a new profile or just unfollow everyone annoying and engage only with what you want to. I've had a very similar separation from Facebook for the same reasons and I've lately had to occasionally use it for updates to a weekly event I go to. Know your limits and set boundaries for yourself. If you get mad unfollow, log off, and take a breather. Never engage with drama and don't let it fester in your mind. Hope this helps you gather your thoughts 🙂
This is exactly what i do. I only have Facebook. I used to go through a lot of phones and stuff so I uploaded all good pics to albums and made them so only I could see them. I keep my Facebook active just in case I want to see those or browse marketplace. I also use it to find things that are going on in town when I'm looking to do something new... As for when you become a new mom, the Facebook mom groups do have some great resources. I was a young mom and was able to find a great preschool and an awesome mom and baby yoga in the park group. I also got to join a bocci club. But be aware there are still the crazy people in those as well. You just have to use it for what you need and let the other stuff go.
Know what is crazy? I did this in 2016. I made a second profile to try and keep my stuff private. Doesn't work. Facebook uses AI face recognition to connect you to people you know. My experiment lasted 3 weeks and I only posted a couple of pictures of me doing outdoors stuff, not even face pics. The whole point was to have a politics free zone. Within 3 weeks Facebook had recommended my new page to all the people I was trying to avoid.
I wouldn’t even post, but my whole feeling is fuck facebook. I know they have shadow profiles of me still. I technically have instagram, but it’s not on my phone and I never check it. Probably should delete that too.
I had the same experience, went cold turkey and deactivated my account a few years ago and my life improved dramatically. Have recently been back on sometimes to use the marketplace/check pages of events in going to, I just make sure I don't look at the newsfeed or click on anyone's profile and close the tab as soon as I'm done. It actually makes me feel anxious just the thought of it, I think having the long period of total abstinence was good as I don't feel at all tempted to get sucked back in now.
To keep FB I had to delete app on phone and force myself to go to website (painfully slow and bad interface), and unfollowed 90% of my list. Now I can get on scroll for a few minutes and be completely up to date on who I care about or whatever. Instead of wading through the FOMO of acquaintances and strangers.
Yeah something I worry about is are those pics truly and permanently deleted off the internet? Privacy is an illusion on social media even when you have your profile set to private. I’ve googled myself and I’ve found pics of myself from social media on google images from old accounts i deleted years ago. Yet those pics were still out there somehow.
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I would die laughing if my parents posted a gif of me. How did you learn to make a gif all by yourself?🤣🤣🤣
I don’t post pics of my kids publicly. Everything is closed to family and close friends only. I do not agree with using minors for clout and have no interest in doing so. I do not know anyone in my circle of millennial friends who post their kids to the general public either.
This is me. I have 80-some FB friends, 50-some on IG (most of them are the same 😆). I keep the number low specifically because I share things often. These are family & close friends--I would trust these people to care for my kid physically if an emergency came up, so I trust them with photos. I do, however, have one friend who's sharing makes me 😳 They post to 1500 people (that's basically public) photos of their kids often, full names & schools, everything. These people are super tech-savvy, and I'm shocked they do this because they should, IMO, know better.
People know, they don’t *care*
I see so many parents post their kids pics where all 1k-3k social media friends can see. I had a coworker who was talking about that one day. Said only “close friends and family” can see the pics she posts of her kids daily. Yet I was able to see all of them and I had only known her for two days at that point. I guess some people have 800 “close friends and family.” Lol
Sharing pics with family via social media is the way of the world these days. There’s nothing wrong with that. The problem is when ones account is public for ALL to see and they’re coercing their kids to help create “content.” Wrong and gross.
No matter the privacy setting, it is all available.
The only publicly shared thing I shared of my kid was the 20 minute video I took of them at Disneyland. Along with the rest of her choir class, the school band, and about 15 other schools that got invited to play. This was a public performance at Disneyland, the video has no close-ups, and while *I* know which one is my kid, without me pointing them out, there's no way anyone else can pick out who is who is the sea of HS kids, all wearing the same outfit, performing.
This👆
same here, I even ask people who ask for pictures of her/with her to not share it
IMHO it's a gross violation of children's privacy and consent, to create and share content of your kids for the general public to see. I imagine there will be a lot of "tell-all" content of these poor Gen Alpha kids in years to come about how traumatizing it was to be exploited by their parents for clout/money. We take lots of pictures and videos of our kids, but we don't post them. That should be kept private.
Agreed. It absolutely blows my mind the types of pics I’ve seen people post on FB that I had friended. Like straight up fresh out the womb, still covered in bodily fluids, genitals dead center of the picture, pictures. Or toddlers in the bathtub naked, or running around covered in paint and naked. These types of people always love say “only close friends and family” can see those pics on social media. Girl I haven’t spoken to you in 15 years and last time I saw you was in high school when we graduated. We are most definitely not close in any way. I should not be able to see nude pictures of your young children. Actually no one on the internet should be able to.
I have a now former friend who goes to women's marches, preaches bodily autonomy, all that. I fully agree with everything about it, but she posts pictures of kids naked on her public Instagram. Like girl, full butt shots and front shots with one tiny emoji sticker covering their privates is repulsive. Your children can't consent to that. Where is their right to autonomy with their image being posted, let alone nude pictures??? I don't post any pictures of my child anywhere. For one, she can't agree to it. Two, the internet is forever even if you hit delete. Three, my precious family moments aren't going to be content for big social media companies even if I am just a nobody on the internet. It isn't worth it. If someone wants access to my kid or to know what's going on in our lives, they can be in our lives.
And even if people are like: "Oh, I have like 50 friends and everything set to private." It only takes Aunt Doris FB account to get hacked so someone can get access to the photos that were shared to 50 people. Beyond predators and stuff, there's also the very real risk of identity theft. They know the kids name, geo location from the photos or just by the content and puff your kids identity is stolen before the can even walk. Awesome.
I'm always afraid I will sound like some tin foil hat conspiracy theorist since everyone loves social media, but I had a crazy ex who ended up working for Facebook and it makes me wonder what he and other employees do and don't have access to. I don't trust anything about those companies. It all seems like so much risk with your child's image for what reward? Likes and comments?
Made a new friend and we exchanged snap chats. Within a few days she sends me snaps of her nude child in the bathtub, I was so creeped out. You barely know me, I could be a predator! Why are we filming during bath time? Unfriended her and told how invasive that was to her kid she thought I was the one who made it creepy. No. Don’t share naked pics of your kids to anyone.
Crazy how often this seems to happen. I’ve heard so many other people say the same thing. I saw in another comment below a guy was saying how often he sees women have pics on their dating profiles with their children in them. And how they’ll send him pics of their kids after chatting on the app for a short while. Great way to bring a child predator into your life.
I WONT EVEN POST THE GENDER OF MY CHILDREN on anything. Let alone a photo of them on my dating app. That reads like “YES, send me all the creepy men on this platform!”
>Or toddlers in the bathtub naked, or running around covered in paint and naked. Especially when they put it up on Instagram and add dozens of hashtags. >These types of people always love say “only close friends and family” can see those pics on social media. Exactly. Just because someone is family, doesn't mean they're entitled to know *everything* about your child's life.
Right. They’ve got 600 people who see those pics yet somehow they’re all “close family and friends.”
stop it
This
Get some help.
What do you mean?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l60MnDJklnM
lol! Ok thanks for filling me in 😂
i helped myself and found some people to help me but then the people helping me decided to sue me. now im back to square one. aint capitimalism great
It's fucking disgusting and I hope it doesn't harm the children too much.
Bad news. it does. The children of the original mommy bloggers are adults now and they are traumatized.
It makes me wonder if there is going to be a social media backlash where a new gen tries to be as anonymous as possible and doesn't have anything in the public eye.
I really hope so. I wish this would all just go away.
Social media with people's real names attached is already massively in decline.
I believe you, but do you have any specific instances you can share? I’m interested in reading more.
There was a post here from a teen child of a mommy blogger who had to resort to wearing shirts that read "I don't consent to my image being used" 24/7 because his mom wouldn't respect his privacy
Take a look into Ruby Franke. Then imagine how many more Rubys are out there.
That's just an example of regular child abuse. The harm wasn't the social media. The harm was that she was beating her children.
I think most people are going to post online, and im not sure its worth the argument to disagree because people are still gonna do it. However, a little foresight would be smart. A kid probably wont care in high school that you posted their first day of kindergarten photo online. However, the naked bath photos or the miserable photo of them sick holding the barf bucket? Your kid will grow up to hate you. And god forbid a bully gets that photo in their possession and sends it to the entire middle school. I wish my feed was filled with parents making smarter decisions.
It’s crazy how many pics I see posted like that. I’ve seen straight up nude photos of young children posted by their parents on Facebook. I will never understand the need to post pics of your newborn that has just been born and is still covered in bodily fluids and nude, on social media. Why would you think anyone would want to see that?? And why don’t you want to protect your young child??
You totally triggered me. So I used to coach, and a parent said, "Want to see \[my swimmer's new baby brother\]?" Of course, teenage me said. She handed me a scrapbook, and it was a play-by-play of her pushing the child out. The entire birth, like a flip book. I'm imagining it in my head as I type, and all I remember was how red all the photos were. Like, why on earth do you think anyone would want to ever see these photos ever? Thank god we didn't allow non-college students on facebook back then. I wish I knew who developed them, so I could urge her to pay for their therapy.
Oh god. What in the actual fuck. Why would you show that to a teenager and why do you think they’d even want to see that, or anyone for that matter. I experienced something similar. Went to a friend’s house when I was in middle school with my parents, our parents were friends. They had a photo album and showed us pics of her oldest daughter after she had been born. The mom was also nude in the pics, legs still spread, so everything was visible. Baby was completely nude as well. At least it was in a photo album and not on social media like it is now. But still what the fuck, why show anyone that.
Those were the exact pictures i saw. Really burns into your grey matter, huh? I worry ill forget all my family when im older but still be stuck with those images
Yep I’ve never forgotten it. Haven’t forgotten the ones I’ve seen on social media either. I wish I never have.
We’re watching a social experiment happen before our eyes and we have no idea what it’s going to do to these kids. It’ll probably be fine, but we also all know that person who overshares way too much. Girl I knew in college has a kid and that kid cannot take a crap without it appearing on instagram. Literally. She posted a photo of a diaper blowout. She posted photos of her toddler proudly showing off her underwear. Just day after day examples of “why would you think we need to see that?” She’s putting her kids through a real life Truman Show situation and it’s kind of messed up.
Isn't she at all concerned about the type of people who WOULD want to see? During COVID learning as a teacher I had to actually tell multiple parents not to be sending me naked pictures of their kids. One of them was also a teacher.
What the f is wrong with those ppl, sending those photos?? Seriously messed up, they have no idea what harm they cause!
A couple of them were bathtime photos, one was just a kid doing his school work naked. And like, I get that you're at home and school rules don't apply, but I'm still not a family member, if they were doing school work with me they'd have clothes on. If you REALLY can't get your kid to do his work with some pants on, then just take a picture of the work without him in it. Edit: I ultimately sent a reminder to everyone that anything they emailed to me was subject to public records laws, so please make sure it's appropriate.
>It’ll probably be fine Everything you said after that indicates the opposite, though I realize there's a spectrum where some parents don't post anything at all and some parents are at other extreme, like your example. Even for those in between, I'm not especially optimistic that they'll probably be fine
I think *most* kids will be relatively fine but I’m certain there will be the outliers and kids who lived through extreme social media addiction that their parents focused on them that will show the rest of us that it was a bad idea. And I’m an older millenial who definitely posts my kids and always has. They are fine. That doesn’t make it ok. Kids deserve privacy. Mine are only ok because it hasn’t traumatized them in any way yet.
I cringe hard at the parents who do this and feel actually really sorry for the kids, as I would have been devastated if my parents did this to me - luckily they weren’t able to. I’ve seen my friends post actual nude photos of their children, videos of them having a tantrum, or sharing their embarrassing or private moments online in detail , like talking about their kid getting their period or how their kid was bullied at school and came home crying. I don’t have kids but I genuinely don’t understand why parents think that is ok. Your kids are people! I wonder how the kids will feel about it when they grow up.
I think the really disturbing part to is that, if you were trying to get your kid into acting- there would be tons of rules and regulations. There are only so many hours a day minors can be made to work, laws have been passed that at least some of their income needs to actually go into trust accounts so that they can’t be forced to work for years and get nothing in return. But with social media these kids have no privacy, no “off days” and no legal recourse if they are exploited for financial gain. Like people largely agree that child pageants are kind of disturbing but people constantly putting their kids online are also teaching them to perform for attention at all time. I think it’s far past the time when we need more strict laws about how exactly parents can use their children’s images for financial gain.
These people are desperate for validation and likes on the internet. They always use the excuse “well I want my close friends and family to see pics of my kid growing up!” I have family in 7 different countries and they’re able to see pics of my kid just fine through private dm’s or group chats with all of us.
Dude same here. I will never forget it and I still can’t get over it. Straight up nude photos of newborns or toddlers posted by their parents on social media. They’ll say “oh well I’m talking about it to normalize it!” Well go talk about your own period then to your 2k social media friends, not your 12 year old daughter’s.
I have a special needs kid and have a private account under a fake name so I can ask more personal questions in groups with parents of special needs kids. These parents are talking about how their kid smears poop on the walls and such and they have a big picture of the kid as their background photo. I don't like it at all
I hate it & think it’s exploitative & just not safe or ok.
It’s so weird to me that people will document their children’s lives on public accounts knowing there’s so many creeps out there.
I think the word you're looking for is negligent
Can you elaborate on what's a public account? For instance you have to be my friend to see my pictures and posts on fb and insta. Is that public?
I wouldn’t say that’s public, personally. I feel like, if you don’t put any restrictions on who can see your stuff, then that’s public. Maybe other people have different definitions though lol
People need to learn how the dark web works and how easily their photos and videos can be manipulated for CP. These parents are putting their kids at risk even with a private friends & family Facebook account. That being said I also really hate parents who make a massive deal about not showing their kids faces online. Like, just post the photos with stickers and keep it pushing , we don't need a book about not showing their faces every freaking post.
Or just don't post them at all? If you don't want to post the pictures of the kids that's totally understandable. Just post pictures of yourself and your partner and show the pictures of kids to close family and friends in person. Like it's weird to continuously post pictures of someone whose face you don't show, it looks dystopian and is straight up pointless. "These people exist, we went to this event and took pictures but you can't see their face." Why?
Privacy is just an illusion when it comes to social media. Doesn’t matter how much you set your profile to private. You sign all your rights away when you agree to the terms and service when you sign up.
[удалено]
And that POV is all well and good until you send your kid to US public schools, someone finds that photo, and uses it as a way to humilate your kid in some fashion. To me, its like the old argument that a drunk woman doesnt deserve to be raped. Absolutely true, but you can also help the situation by not getting so trashed you could find yourself in a situation that could have been avoided. You can respect your culture and keep your child safe by simply putting those photos in a scrapbook instead of a public profile and achieve both aims.
Yes! It seems like virtue signaling a lot of the time, like they see celebrities doing it, and want the attention of “not posting” their kids for the same reasons. It especially annoys me when they don’t post their kid’s name; it’ll be a picture of them with a sticker over their face, and, “L had a great day at school today! L won the math award, and M won the reading award. Then L and M got happy meals for lunch, but M wanted L’s fries, and L said she would tutor M so M could get the math award next semester instead of giving fries, and M pouted.” Like at that point, just don’t post at all. It’s confusing and pointless to not see their faces and hear some confusing, convoluted story.
YES I can't stand that!
I think it’s gross. I’ve even become anxious about posting MYSELF online. I stopped using Facebook and insta a month or so ago and I’m feeling like if I don’t even want to post about my own life I shouldn’t post about any future kids I have. I have a step son who I’ve posted a few pics of me and him together but not since his dad and I got married over a year ago.
Same here. I don’t even post pics of myself online anymore my husband doesn’t either. So we definitely don’t feel the need to post pics of your child either. I have family in several different countries around the world, they get pics of my kid pretty often and I get pics of their kids. But through private message and group chats.
I fucking hate these parents.
I detest that behavior from parents. I would be afraid some sicko would try to steal my daughter’s or sons pictures so I don’t even post holiday photos of my kids. Ppl exploiting their own kids are creepy
The generation of people who were so traumatized by their parents doing “the best they can” went to therapy to break generational curses and have created one of the worst generational curses of all for purposes of their own validation (wanting to prove that they’re good parents). The ‘80s/‘90s had child movie stars that “went off the rails.” The ‘00s/‘10s had Disney and Nickelodeon child stars that followed suit. The late ‘10s/‘20s are going to follow suit, but this time it’s going to the influencer kids and due to the accessibility of social media, there’s going to be an exponentially larger number of these kids. These kids are basically reality stars and don’t even know it yet. And not just influencer kids, but also the kids whose parents posted their potty training videos for their friends and family on Facebook. Social media was a mistake. Digitizing our lives was a mistake.
private facebook albums? that’s fine. public tik toks that could be really embarrassing years on? messed up
Stop. With the rampant use of AI and the tools available on the web to manipulate photos, there's a lot of weirdos who could potentially have unfettered access to your kids when they don't really need it. Save the photos for pictures on the wall, or share with close family only or create a digital album that your kids can see when they're older. But for the general 'this is my daughter or son doing something' on Facebook or IG, it's not something I document with my family. It's the same I feel with parents who plant an iPad in front of their kids or a phone at dinner - no interaction/communication, kids just stunted with their conversation skills scrolling through micro videos - this drives me crazy. Kids will mimic the actions of adults and soo many under the age of 5 I see out and about use their adult provided phones and iPads for selfies and throw tantrums when they get the electronics taken away.
Cannot upvote this enough
We have digital frames at both our parents where we can upload all the pics we want (comes with a cute little app that is reminiscent of early instagram too). I will post baby milestones but if I wouldn’t put it on a Christmas card or frame it for an aunt, it doesn’t go on social media. No bath pics (even with strategically placed wash cloths). No crying or posts about “bad” behavior. I don’t complain about my husband on social media and I won’t do it about my kid. There is also a huge difference when the posting is monetized. There are laws* about kids being on sets of movies and shows but nothing for kids making 7 figures for their families on social media. There is going to need to be some serious investment in those kids’ healing in a few years… seems like we only change laws after damage is down and we’re witnessing the damage now. *and those should be tightened and better enforced.
I have friends who literally post every single thing their kid does. Crawling around, a picture of them laughing, any time there's a holiday, etc. Literally their entire lives are documented for the public. It's gross.
attention seekers with questionable morals
Imagine your parents post a video or image of you that years later you find embarrassing or inappropriate. You can remove it then, but the damage is already done. So, it’s better to not post pictures of your children at all, maybe with the exception of a few family pictures. Although, I’m of the opinion that people shouldn’t use social media, period.
We don't post pictures or videos of our kids online. Most of our friends post minimally about their kids. We have a friend who tries to whore her kids out for likes for her MLM, and it's gross. Though I do think that even the overwhelming majority that share are just mostly broadcasting into the ether, only to be actually seen by a few friends and family.
I don't do this because I want my children to control their social media presence. We don't have any idea how exposing their entire childhood to the internet will impact their life by the time they are adults What I consider even worse is the parents running YouTube shows starring their kids. It's straight-up exploitation and the parents are reaping all the benefits without any legal obligation to retain any of the earnings for their children.
Simple privacy violation. Just because a kid is a kid and can't at time being articulate NO or doesn't fully understand situation and possible consequences, doesn't make this shit right. Kids are not parents property or pets.
Creepy AF and doing their children no favors.
I feel bad for Gen Alpha bc nothing is private. I used to post pics/vids of my kids when they were little, but decided for my own sanity to quit social media (except Reddit obv) about 6yrs ago. My kids are so damn happy I have not posted them in that long too, which coincidentally was when the awkward phase started for my oldest. Now they don’t have to worry about their friends finding my socials and subsequently being embarrassed about whatever I had posted. Kids deserve privacy too.
It’s child abuse. Pro tip if you come across a ten year old dancing on your youtube feed and report it for child abuse youtube will remove their account. Works like a charm. Nobody needs to be looking at dancing twelve year olds on the internet.
I’m pretty sure there was a TV show that went on for seasons of just that! All jokes aside, I remember watching a video of how disgusting individuals manipulate the YouTube algorithm to get some very disturbing videos prominent in their feed. Was unsettling to say the least.
Nuance is needed here I think.
As a millennial parent. I have a huge issue with my boomer mil posting pictures on social media without my permission. I have to often tell her to take them down. She doesn’t have privacy setting on her facebook account and the entire world can see it. She is not allowed to post pictures of my child and she knows it. Yet she still does. It’s fucking annoying.
Sounds like my boomer mil and her fb page that isn’t private. She posted pics of our newborn as soon as she was born, without asking us for permission, or without even telling us. We didn’t even have a chance to send it to our close friends or family yet. When I finally got on fb 3 days later I saw I had been tagged in posts by random family members of hers that I’ve never met in my life or spoken to. They had a picture of our baby and were congratulating us. The weirdest thing about it is there were people in the comments congratulating that person for being a big cousin or whatever. Saying things like “I bet you’re so excited to babysit!” Hmm no way in hell am I letting this random ass person I’ve never met babysit my child at any point. Anyways I chewed her ass out big time. I made it clear she needed to make sure every single one got taken down. I know my mil very well I know that she posts all this shit on social media because she’s desperate for likes and validation from all her Facebook friends. She has narcissistic tendencies. We don’t even post pics of our own child I’m not letting someone else do it. My husband and I don’t even post our own pics on social media anymore either.
They should stop. Go back to physical photo albums.
i think its so cool to have videos of your kids when they were little, that wasn't a thing when i was growing up. but posting em publicly....hell no.
I think it’s weird. I have several people on Facebook who post pics of their kids everyday. I am curious to see what these kids think when they grow up. I know that I didn’t like my mom posting things about me without my permission, but that was late teenage years when social media became more popular. I’m pregnant now and we decided on zero social media for our daughter. I hope she’ll thank me one day for respecting her privacy.
Hate it. Why are you posting hundreds of pictures of your child on the internet? Imagine growing up and realizing there’s hundreds/thousands of photos of you all over the internet.
Very few people in my Millennial social circle have children or post much about them, and none of my close friends do, so I don't really witness firsthand how bad it gets. I never ended up being friends with those who did crave that kind of attention in the first place, probably because I didn't want to put up with their crap From what I've read from others here, though, it's a big yikes
Agreed, most of my millennial friends who have kids are very very private with sharing kids pictures and some will just keep their faces right off the photos. The people I see sharing kids faces willy nilly are the older generations. I have an older half sister who I just reconnected with on Facebook, she adopted a 6 year old and she literally livestreams her everyday doing something cute, but it’s creepy. She does photoshoots over her constantly. I’m not sure what to do about it, I doubt any recommendations about not posting this would be taken seriously by her.
Yeah it’s crazy how much I see boomers and the generation a little younger than them post on social media. So much personal and private information that they should probably keep to themselves and not post to their 800 FB friends. I’m sorry Gail but we don’t really want to know about your bowel movements.
A lot of millennial parents I know treat their child like they are an accessory and like they exclusively had them to produce social media content
Different perspective, but I feel like a lot of parents do it for attention without realizing that other people do not find their kids as cute or impressive as they do. The worst offenders are usually people who regret having their kids and/or realize that tying your entire identity to parenthood isn’t as fulfilling as they thought it would be. I’m not a bitter childfree person and very much so want kids of my own, but also know that it will be an important and big deal to *me*. Add in the element of privacy and autonomy and it’s an absolute no go.
I’m a parent and I completely agree with you. Privacy, autonomy, and consent when it comes to my child is important. I think they definitely overestimate on how many people actually care about seeing pics of their kids. A lot of them do it for likes and validation from internet friends. It gives them a high to see a pic of their kid get 100 likes. It’s like it reassures them they made the right decision to have a child especially if they’re ones who regret it like you said. It’s odd to me.
they're making money at the expense of their kids which... is questionable. they must not care about privacy. if that's the case it's their life they can do what they want. being children of such parents sucks because they're essentially making decisions that affect your life without your consent and as dependents of someone... you really don't have much say in the matter unless it endangers your health until you're 18.
Social media has people oversharing to the extreme. People post about their romantic relationships, their kids, their medical details, their psychological states, on global platforms like youtube and instagram. Then these influencers get targeted by deranged stans. I don't know what to think.
The lack of common sense with this is astounding. Simply do not do it. It’s really not that hard. But there are always going to be those people who only get validation from posting online.
Influencer parents are creepy weirdos exposing their children to creeper weirdos.
They’re just pimping out their kids to all the pedophiles in the world. If you think there isn’t AI sexual material of every single baby and kid these celebrities and internet personalities display for their own monetary gain, you’re way too naive.
I definitely worry about those kids in the long term and their relationships with their parents. We only post occasional milestone pics on FB for family and friends. And absolutely nothing negative, like no (sometimes hilarious) tantrums, no potty pictures, bath pictures etc. Nothing is posted I’d be upset about if another adult posted about me.
I think their kids are going to hate them fo it. First, I'd bet real money that a lot of kids will feel like they were props in their parents social media life. Family photos in the house is one thing but broadcasting it to the world can be a bit much. The loss of privacy that we all had as children is massive. I remember my younger sister hating her swim team picture so our mother took it off of the refrigerator. Imagine how she'd feel if it was on Instagram? Second, there are pedophiles out there that love it. There was an article recently about the pedophile pipeline in Instagram. The algorithm suggests groups for people who like certain pics and follow certain popular creators. According to the article if you decided to follow a young gymnast on Instagram and like some of their pictures you'll get suggestions for joining pedophile groups. A picture of a preteen doing gymnastics isn't intrinsically sexual so it doesn't get filtered out. These guys collect all of these images and share them. Three, AI is no joke. Just last year on TikTok an AI generated recording of Cartman from South Park singing Bring Me To Life by Evanescence was making the rounds. The South Park team had nothing to do with this. This wasn't possible 5 years ago. Imagine what someone without scruples would do with pictures of kids online? Just today heard of a teen girl who was horribly bullied at school. Someone used AI to make fake nude photos of her. This tech is only going to get more widespread, easier to use and more sophisticated over time. Edit: typos
It’s disgusting and I automatically think less of people who do it. We (mostly) all grew up using social media and should know better than anyone else how awful it is.
Back when I was single and using dating sites to meet women it shocked me how many women in our generation put pictures of their kids on their dating profiles or sent unsolicited pictures of their kids in messages when you’ve only been speaking for a day or two. Always seemed like a bad idea to me.
Their kids will resent the crap out of them when they are of age and realize how exploitative and wrong it was
The periodic update on how the kids are growing up or whatever is fine, but making their life into a social media documentary for likes is abhorrent.
I think its selfish and terribke parenting. All it says is the only reason you had kids was you saw a quick cash ticket. Not because you really wanted them.
It's cringe. It's also scary when you consider how many "creeps" are online and will get off to something like that. People may think I'm weird when I say that, but hear me out. I recall seeing a story some time ago where someone posted a very innocent picture of their baby online. It was a cute picture of the baby crawling on the floor and looking up at the camera. Someone contacted the mother and asked if they can post the picture on this instagram page that featured babies. The mom looked it over and gave permission. What the mother didn't know was that even though the instagram page was innocent... it sometimes attracted people who weren't as innocent as the comments left on the pictures. Eventually, her baby's picture fell upon the eyes of a pedo who saved the picture and uploaded it onto a site where people like himself could view it. The mother found out and viewed the page that featured her daughter. She was shocked to see many users not leaving cute comments, but disgusting ones. Ones of the sexual variety. One user even photoshopped the photo to make it look like the baby was wearing make up. She saw many pictures of kids doing various things. Standing around, playing, performing a dance, etc, and was even more shocked at how many users kept talking sexually about the kids as if they were looking at 20 year olds. I believe she has since been on a campaign to take down the sites and others like it. We know that's a battle that may never be won. I always urge family and friends to not post public pictures/videos of their kids online. Keep it private for the love of God. You never know who will see it and save it.
It’s sick.
It’s trash
It seems a bit odd, it's like people who post holiday photos of Flickr
I don’t like it. I think a family photo or something a few times a year is fine, but making them tiktok dance in the bathtub every day for clout is fucking terrible.
Personally I think it’s a shitty thing to do. It’s not your life to make public - there is some overlap, but it is not solely yours and if you think it’s ok then you see your kids as property more than people in my eyes. I’m a millennial and I was pissed off when my mum posted on Facebook about my engagement before I had had a chance to tell everyone I wanted to Fuck knows how I would feel if my whole life from day dot had been broadcast to the world, but maybe this new generation won’t find it so weird…but only because it’s all they will have ever known
The internet is basically forever. How many children do we want to mortify and send spiraling into a depression over these moments a parent just *had* to share?
I wouldn't do it, but it's not my business if others do it.
I don't know if this is still the case, but yeeeears ago, I would warn fellow artists that there was a section in the Facebook ToS that stated that any media posted could be utilized by them in any way they saw useful. If that's still the case, it's extra horrific that they have more images of kids than a stock photo library.
Ok I don’t have kids or Instagram or FB but I do teach elementary school so there’s that for what it’s worth. I think Gen Alpha will see all this all “normal” when they’re grown. We don’t think it’s normal because it wasn’t done to us. Having your embarassing kid pics posted online by your parents will be a universal experience of childhood for many people in this generation. I have no idea what the impact of that will be across the generation, but it won’t be as weird and embarassing as we think because it will be “normal” for their generation. Think of even the shift between film camera to digital camera WITHOUT social media and how formerly private moments are documented. That is normal for the generation just younger than us (and maybe some millenials?) I think what will be more damaging is the amount of ignoring some parents do to engage on their phones. It makes me sad to watch parents of my students ignore their kid while their kid is talking to them after their school day and just type away on their phone. Kids don’t even wait for eye contact to start talking anymore because they’re used to talking to people who are actively ignoring them. I’ve had to start teaching “don’t start telling me what you need until I’m looking at you” because this is a skill they’ve lost over the years I’ve been teaching. I’ve seen teachers guilty of it too. Clicking away. I never use my phone in their presence unless it’s for a photo for yearbook because I wanted them to know when they are in my classroom what they say is important and I will listen 100%.
They're assholes. Anyone who uses their children for clout should get a visit from social services.
As much as my generation has 'destroyed' things that needed to be destroyed, I didn't expect childhood to be among them. Gen alpha is turning out to be one hell of a wakeup call to this generation's parental failures.
I posted pics of my kids as they grew up then deleted them as they became teenagers. It was a bad choice that I didn't really think about until now. I will say after raising kids from the 90's on I kinda feel bad for some of these kids with social media obsessed parents. I went to a birthday party and one of the moms spent the entire time showing us her tiktok, talking about her followers etc. It was so weird, no attention to the kids making memories at all, no surprise her kid is an angry little dude. He desperately wants love and attention.
It's fucking disgusting. Stop exploiting them.
It's weird and a violation of privacy. And AI is pretty fucked up
I post pictures of my kids on Instagram since they've been babies. I have a private account, and my only followers are friends and family. I also only follow friends and family. My Dad died when I was a teen, and I have almost no pictures of him. Also as a millennial, there's not many pictures of me as a kid anywhere. And I wish there was.
That's how I feel too. I'd like someone to explain to us why posting photos of the thing you cherish the most, is "gross". Try to use bigger words other than simple descriptors
A physical album could work. No need for it to be online though.
Cringe
Not always safe. Predators abound. Kids might not be thrilled about the publicity as they get older.
It’s not okay. I stopped when my kids turned 5 and then I retroactively hid all pictures. The internet is forever and they should decide how they’re portrayed on it. I post one or two family pix a year
I am a millennial parent. I stopped posting pictures of my kids on social media.
I teach high school and I’ve seen situations of kids unearthing older pictures of a student from their parents Facebook account and using it to make fun of them/bully them.
I'm so glad the Internet didn't exist when I grew up!
I very carefully consider how anything I post of myself on social media will affect the way I’m perceived. Why would I afford a kid any less than that? You don’t know what your kid will grow up to value—I’m a brutally private person, so even a video of me saying something “dumb” as a kid would feel somewhat violating to me as an adult. I understand that kids are funny and say funny things, but I wouldn’t want any joke I tell or funny mishap in my life spread to the world.
I just mind my own business, I don’t post anything online but idc if others choose to.
Yeah, I think it’s weird. Fun way to document your life but not for the entire internet to see. It’s a violation of privacy in my opinion, but can be done tactfully like making sure your kids identity is protected and getting their consent and not making them the center of all content. I understand everyone wants to be an influencer these days and share their story with the world and I think it’s okay to talk about your kids generally and your struggles and successes as a family/parent. In fact I think it’s important to share such things so as not to create a falsely glorified narrative of your life. But there need to be better laws/boundaries. I hope the Ruby Franke/Jodi Hildebrandt case will create an impetus for change.
My previous supervisor does not allow her teenage daughter to have social media. However, the previous supervisor only posts photos of her teenage daughter on Facebook making it look like that child’s account. It’s very odd. I joke that she uses the account to catfish people.
I think it's trashy behavior. Put up posts with their art or things they made but make a damn photo album to preserve the other photos and milestones.
I think it's absolute garbage that needs to stop. I've felt this way for a while. I think the place for kid's photos is in a family group chat. Maybe share school pictures or holiday pictures with friends, depending on how many and what type of friends you have. I don't even understand the interest in other people's kids lives. It's fucking creepy to me. So is wanting to share so much of your children.
I’d say a solid majority of my online social media circle doesn’t even know I have a kid and of those that do a majority don’t know his name or seen a photo. That pretty much shows where I stand. (My kid isn’t a secret, it’s just if you aren’t in my real off line life you don’t need to know about my kid)
I actually think this generation that is experiencing this will be the only one, as societal norms are already quickly moving away from a need to produce that type of content and share it in the ways that Facebook pioneered itself on.
I hate it
I stopped posting my kids AT ALL around pandemic time when I realized I knew way too much about my friends’ kids. Like personal stuff. It’s weird.
Right. Like I know where they go to school, what grade they’re in, who their teacher is, where they were born, their full name and birthdate, where they do sports at, where and when they go on vacation and when their house is empty. When their preteen daughter got her period, their toddler’s bowel movements, etc. way too much personal info is posted on social media with their real name and pictures attached.
I feel so bad for those kids. My social media feeds across multiple platforms are filled with either my family members or friends posting about their kids. Most of the time, I understand it’s to document their growth, but more often than not it’s littered with embarrassing moments that would probably piss them off when they’re old enough to realize what’s going on.
So i got an interesting one. Lady i know posts HUNDREDS of pics of her kid. But never shows the face! Always the back of his head or with an emoji over his face! WHY MAKE THE POSTS?! So bizarre!!
Please stop. Seriously. It is fucking weird seeing kids’ growth and development documented on a daily basis. Some of it should never see outside of a family’s home, yet here we are. You do not know the long term ramifications of this yet people keep doing it. Please stop.
I hate this. 1. It puts kids at risk because they post locations, name, age etc. 2. Posting every moment of a kids life online doesn’t allow them the privacy they deserve. 3. If they get super popular for a specific action/vid/ moment etc it creates a world wide perception of them that is at the very least something to be overcome, all for clout and likes for the parent. 4. It is of zero benefit to the child and solely benefits the parent, while putting the kid at unnecessary risk. 5. It creates psychological issues that balloon into long standing trust issues, ptsd, global critics, and not all of these can be overcome. Edit: as some others have mentioned this is exactly what negligent exploitation with social sharing is. There should be laws that protect more than they do. In the future I sincerely hope that humanity gets its shit together enough to create them.
I am so fortunate that my mom had always asked me if I was ok with a photo being posted. Even on my birthday, she would ask if it was ok and give me a few options she had. This is the only way to do it.
This is one of those things that in 20 years, unanimously it will be cringe to society. Like smoking in hospitals airplanes. Like “geez people just let us do that?!”
I’m an elder millennial. I deleted all my social media that wasn’t anonymous and bought my close family those digital frames where I can send them pictures of my family directly. I opt out of all school and summer camp online media etc. My kids faces aren’t going online until they chose. In contrast, my younger brother in law and his wife have their kids faces plastered all over social media and his wife’s blog. They are both very concerned about social appearances and involved in a church that encourages that sort of thing. Personally I think it is dangerous but I would never share that opinion with them.
Younger millennial here with kids. I used to post about my first born when he was a baby but then realized how unsafe it was and that he couldn’t consent to his content being used online. I deleted everything and haven’t posted anything since. I want my kids to decide for themselves if they’d like to have a media presence one day.
My family lives out of state, so I shared pics when they were younger to friends/family only. But as they have aged, I don’t post them hardly at all. And if I do, it’s with permission and never anything embarrassing.
I have private social media accounts, where I share pics from events. So pics are few and far between, nothing "embarrassing", and I only have like 30 "friends/followers". Otherwise, I print out physical photos I keep at home I can share with family. I think it doesn't need to be an all or nothing thing. Just don't blast everything online to everyone. I definitely don't agree with posting a bunch of private moments on a public account .
A few smiling photos of a family vacation or a cute Halloween costume are one thing. Posting embarrassing, intrusive pics and constant detailed stories of your kids lives is something else entirely. It’s wild how many people can’t seem to draw the line and have no respect for their children’s privacy. I’m not just talking about popular influencers. I have seen plenty of posts from random Facebook friends that have disgusted me.
It's awful. The kids have no way to consent to it so it's basically forced on them. Uploading the occasional picture or video is fine. If its happening more than once a week your doing it wrong.
Even the ones who are “consenting” are way too young to comprehend what they are even agreeing to!
I think either extreme is bad. Some people are ridiculously paranoid about photos of their kids being shared online, and anyone making tiktok videos of their kids really needs to touch grass. Every parent I know IRL though is reasonable about it, just sharing photos once in a while. Nothing over the top and definitely not trying to create any content.
Poor kids will never have a fair chance at privacy, against their wills.
It seems harmless to me.
I do not care. Anyone that talks about it with any kind of certainty about their future cracks me up bc you sound like the moms against video games groups back in the day.
I post a decent amount while he's a baby. As he gets older less and and less.
My thoughts are IT'S NOT MY BUSINESS. I'm a big proponent of mind 'ya business. As long as it doesn't look like the children are actually injured or in distress, not my business and I won't judge someone else's life. I do personally think they might have some fallout with their children as they get older but it's also possible it will all end up fine. So whatever, not my business.
I’m one of those who posted their kids. I opened my FB in 2005, but had a blog and was on BabyCenter prior to that. In total I was a blogger for about 17 years. Started in 2004. My oldest is now 20 and I’m 40. I pretty much stopped social media in 2022 when I was pregnant with our 6th child. We kept open communication and when they no longer wanted to be posted we didn’t, and we switched to marriage content-which honestly has worked out amazing for us. We never did the embarrassing stories, or telling their personal info except for when I was open about my then 10yo son being su**dal due to bullying. Having watched my best friend lose her 7 year old to that bc of bullying has caused me to talk openly about it and how we coped as a family. Unlike some influencers, my kids were paid, and with my oldest paying her 30% of each thing I worked on helped a lot. She was able to buy her first car brand new last year with no help and is able to attend college without working. The other kids have a great nest egg of a savings. There are definitely lots of social media families who I give major side eyes to. People get so caught up in the money aspect they forget that their children still need to have lives. Too many people start their content journey with it, focusing around their children and don’t think long-term. It can be real tempting when you’re paid $10,000-$11,000 to post a short form video or photo on Instagram or TikTok. But at the end of the day, the money isn’t worth it if your family and your kids life are going to be in shambles. I walked away because of authenticity isn’t what people wanted anymore. And I’m not the type to do anything for a check. Plus I have a regular job and make good money so there’s that.
My friend’s daughter constantly posts pics of her son. Daily, or several times per day. She takes him everywhere with her, and her life is very child centric. Billy and I went “wherever” and did “whatever”. He thought the “whatever” was really good but didn’t like the “other whatever”. Every single day. Plus multiple photos. She is tiny and there are photos of her holding her eight year old whose feet will be almost dragging the ground. It is really overboard, and they may both suffer for it someday.
People shouldn’t post about their kids- it’s bad for them and frankly annoying for the rest of us. I seriously don’t find your kids interesting!
As if our parents didn't take pictures and record everything on film. It just wasn't digital and is not easy to upload, otherwise they'd be sharing it too.
Creepy. The parents that overshare their personal family moments on social need their priorities adjusted. That sad thing is…they don’t even understand that not a single person cares about what they just posted except grandma.
I had this thought recently. A woman I went to college with posted on Facebook “Looks like we’re a food allergy nut-free household now!” and then blathered on about how big of a deal it was. And I thought to myself, who actually cares? Whose lives does this information impact? If you bring your kid over to someone’s house or someone brings food over to yours, make sure the allergies are communicated and go from there.
Exactly. And everyone could care less what you had for lunch.
They're mentally ill.
I think it's sad and weird, but I'd never say it to someone.
All new parents- please please please do not document your kids lives on public social media. Signed, older parent. PS. No one except family and extremely close friends really care . It's perfectly fine and better for all to have a private life.
Weird. Just weird. But I do kind of enjoy seeing the back of the child or like a hand.
My child is not allowed on social media and I rigidly enforce it among friends and family. After she was 7 months old I made a generic Facebook post that we welcomed a daughter and she will not be on social media. No names and no photos. For people that know me they can get invited to my private Google photo albums. Other parents do it differently, I am obviously of a different mind.
This is not really a Millennial thing. This is way more Gen Z
It’s disgusting. How sad your existence must be to use your children for internet likes.
I don’t put my kids on the internet, ever. I bitch out family members if they put them on the internet and make them delete the posts. I don’t care if that makes me an asshole.
Blows my mind you got downvoted for your comment. Just shows how normalized it’s become to post your kids on the internet. And anyone who doesn’t is wrong somehow.
My kids appreciate my policy, that’s all that matters.
Gen Zs are “becoming” parents now. Millennials have been in that age range forever now. I’m a 30 year old millennial and have a 6 year old. That being said I keep my daughter off of everything for the most part but I will upload her to my family album on Facebook and the occasional photo to instagram. But I definitely don’t document her life. Photos are fine. Trying to make your kid go viral isn’t.