Respecting your child's privacy on social media

abundancenow · June 2014

This news story, I hope, opens some public discussion regarding respecting a child's right to privacy on social media.

A mother in Australia was profiting as much as $200 to picture products with her child on an Instagram account in her 2 year old daughters name. The account has 17,000 + followers. Instagram shut the account down, but has gone back on that decision and re opened the account.

I don't have accounts on any of the the social medias like, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram for various reasons. In part, I did find it challenging to manage how much I wanted to share of my personal life.

Obviously, I do share here, so I am not totally against online sharing of parenting.

I feel that there are so many Mommy bloggers that exploit the image of their child for money and free products and that it robs child of privacy. I think it is not limited to parents who profit, but also people who want attention through sharing their child's intimate moments through pictures and stories online.

Where do others feel the line should be drawn?

INmommy871278 · June 2014

I find it odd when people open social media accounts for their kids and/or animals. I have gotten friend request from friends and family who do this and I refuse to accept them because it's nms personally and is just odd to me. I do post pics of DS on occasion for family, but is post maybe 2 a month and I know everyone personally that I am friends with on Facebook so it's not like I have 17,000 strangers on my friend list and I have the privacy settings set so people have to have permission to share my pics and only friends can view the pics.

abundancenow · June 2014

I know my parents had photo albums and shared them with friends, so the concept of sharing with close family and friends seems fine, but unlimited public access of a baby's life, seems to break healthy boundaries. When profit is gained, I think it makes it worse. I wonder if the money goes directly to the babies, or one day will we see children suing parent's for using their image for profit?

As for pets, it's silly but, not so much damaging to the quality of life of the pet, like I feel the same over sharing could be to a human.

Allison546 · June 2014

Yeah, this is definitely a big issue, and each family should decide what guidelines to follow. I share pics of DS on Instagram and FB (and obviously here in my siggy) but don't go overboard in frequency or content. The biggest thing I take issue with is others posting bathtub and naked pics, etc. I don't care how old or young your kid is, or how great you think you've managed your privacy settings:. Please don't put their private parts on social media.. that way crosses the line IMO.

abundancenow · June 2014

@symphony4586, it may sound extreme to some who don't really consider the consequences, but I can respect your view. DH has a few family members who share every picture they take on their facebooks and have 500+ friends. I've had to ask them pics down before and they do, but do not seem to get the issue of being respectful of others privacy and seem put out. Plus, once something is on the internet, you can remove it, but it was still there and could be saved in some data storage somewhere.

kwh33ls · June 2014

We're probably going to go the route of a good friend of ours using Photo Stream...they post their cute baby pics there, and invite only those that will/might care to see the pics, and they get their own photo album on their phone/cloud devices. They still post a pic every now and then on FB or whatever, but mostly they're kept out of the public eye, which I like. I have a pretty limited FB friend list, but DH has everyone and their brother on his list, so I'd just assume keep the pics that are "out there" to a minimum.

SuperTinkerham · June 2014

I am torn on this. On one hand I want to AW my little Monster within reason. On the other hand I don't want MIL or my Mom sharing pics all willy nilly.

Pinksundrops · June 2014

I used to blog and would post photos of the back of my kiddos heads, not their faces. When my oldest DS turned ten (now 15) I stopped blogging about them. Figured once they are old enough to track their own life on social media, it's not fair to them to do it for them. My oldest did love me tagging him in all the fun pictures I took and now bemoans pictures I want to take because I don't do anything with them, so I have been on the fence lately on sharing more again. When I do share, I have my Facebook settings set to where only about 90 of my closest friends and family (ones I see on a regular personal basis or at least once a year if they are out of town) can see my posts. I believe my instagram is private and I only have 30 or so followers so I post there more (which is still only once a week or so at most these days), but I better double check.

mamakiss · June 2014

SO and I had to come to a reasonable agreement on our LO's media presence. I have a blog (not popular by any means and I don't profit from it) and I'm wanting to share pictures everywhere because I don't have much privacy for myself. We decided I can share limited pictures on my blog, and we both went through and filtered out anyone we wouldn't want seeing pictures of LO on social media sites, we made everything as private as can be, and set up a separate and private Instagram account for our parents and close family where we will post the majority of pictures we do post. We also decided nothing that could be seen as inappropriate (bath tub, naked baby butts, etc) could be shared on any avenue of social media.

This is all because of SO's desire for privacy and my complete willingness to work around it. It would make me uncomfortable if I was profiting off of my child, I feel like that's some breech of trust... Especially if I had thousands and thousands of people watching their every move, that makes even me uncomfortable.

I think it's definitely one of those things where parents have to agree and engage in conversation about it, especially the way media presence is everywhere now.

[Deleted User] · June 2014

The user and all related content has been deleted.

tealowl · June 2014

I'm okay with sharing pictures on my FB (I have a small friends list that I am comfortable with), and I don't plan on posting tons and tons of pictures of baby.

I have IG too which will become private once I post pics of the baby.

DD has an IG and FB (she's almost 13), but both are private, and we've had talks about pictures being online forever, and she's not allowed to sign up for anything else without my knowledge. Obviously when she gets older she could totally do whatever online without me knowing, but I'm hoping my opinions and values hold over her (like we've talked about sexting and stuff).

Her pics get 'shared' sometimes by my parents and DD's dad and his side of the fam, but I can't make rules for her Dad, he's not going to adhere to anything I would say about it.

I am concerned over people putting this babys picture up on FB without my consent, especially if someone were to try and do it before we even got a chance to make any type of public announcement. I'll be telling my parents to not do it, hopefully S/O will say the same to his Mom. They are the only ones allowed at the hospital anyway after the birth.

[Deleted User] · June 2014

Does FB let you lock picture settings to where it won't allow someone to share or save a photo you've posted? That would be awesome. I've already got a lock down on most of my settings but they keep changing things- it's hard to keep up sometimes!

chevronseven · June 2014

I think this goes along with labor laws regarding child actors and models. They're entitled to a certain amount of the profits and there are strict limits as to how long or how often they can work. I think it's a personal choice whether to have pictures of your child made public, but if there's any profit coming from it then they are entitled to a fair share. Honestly I will not hesitate to get my child into acting or modeling if the opportunity presents itself (and my kid doesn't object), so I think the cry for their right to privacy is a little bit of an overreaction.

tealowl · June 2014

symphony4586 said:

I miss the days when old people with no common sense about the internet couldn't get a Facebook account.

My Dad will post a status...and then share it. He has no idea thats literally a double post. Lolzzzz Dad.

tealowl · June 2014

This thread reminds me of a post my aunt shared over the weekend.

Some teenage girl got drunk and almost died, so her mother took a picture of her at the hospital with tubes all in her and in a coma, and then posted this long rant about what her daughter did and how dangerous teen alcohol use is, blah blah blah. Trying to help others I guess by showing the internet a picture of her daughter in that kind of state?

Well apparently it's been shared TENS OF THOUSANDS of times, and thousands commented on the original post, and the mom was in the comments all thankful she reached out to so many people and was just fucking delighted about it.

So I commented on my aunts share about how inappropriate it was for her mom to do this. Potential employers could find that picture and not hire her. She could get bullied at school for it. Not to mention her privacy in a hospital.

I just don't get the whole trend of shaming your children online. If that happened to my daughter, I wouldn't dream of posting her like that online.

chevronseven · June 2014

@tealowl‌ I definitely agree that publicly shaming your children online is not ok. Especially in that situation. Why not just a simple "My daughter was irresponsible with alcohol and is lucky to be alive now, please drink responsibly," instead of a picture of her in such an awful state? I would be mortified if my mother did that to me. People forget that the Internet is forever....

abundancenow · June 2014

I do not know if child labor laws are applicable for internet profits like this or for assuring profit is shared with the child who's image garners the profit. I imagine since the Instagram account in the article is so public, and the story is in the news that the mom is going to have to share any profits accordingly with her child in this case.

I am thinking of parenting blogs that may not be so successful financially, but maybe a mom gets some free swag for whoring out her kid and doing a sponsored post. Perhaps they don't make any money, but with a few 1,000 followers they get some free junk. How can a newborn object? It may take decades before a person realizes that their mom traded 100s of baby pics publicly online for a few free t shirts.

Just because your under 18 does your parent have the right to decide the value of your privacy and sell you out for some coupons for free products? I think it's interesting to see where people draw the line.

1982Babies · June 2014

TheAnne said:

I plan on sharing my life with my close friends and family via facebook. I don't plan on profiting over my child's image. I think facebook albums are no worse than sharing physical paper and photo albums with close friends and family. However, I am not "friends" with people on FB that I wouldn't be willing to share a hard copy of an album with in my living room over coffee. Any gripes from my kids as preteens over embarrassing moments documented on film/digital files will get an eye roll from me. Having said that, I don't post anything inappropriate like naked bath pics.

I'm with @theanne -- most of my family lives out of state and my nearly 90 year old grandmother loves it that she can log into Facebook at any time and see new pictures (ones that may not be "picture frame worthy", but just day to day pics).

My cat also has a Facebook page. He doesn't give a shit though.

tealowl · June 2014

I'm FB friends with my friends dog. He's hilaaaaarious.

Acsim · June 2014

I have my FB and IG accounts pretty locked down. I share pictures of DD1 all the time, in fact if I haven't for a while, people will ask what she's up to. I don't post anything inappropriate regarding her. I mean I curse and stuff and get inappropriate on other posts... But never anything with her. I won't hesitate to share pics of DD2. I do need to do a massive clean out on both because there's people on my FB that I seriously only talk to when the birthday thing pops up and I think to myself "I'm still friends with them?" I'm 31 years old, kinda don't care anymore about the gaggle of high school acquaintances and keeping up with them like I used to.

Also, if my MIL shares the baby's birth before I do, I'll break her arm. That is all.

abunai523 · June 2014

Luckily, both DH and I come from extremely tech-savvy families (my grandma plans events and trips via the family facebook group for example), and there is zero concern about anybody sharing anything bad with the public at large. Nobody who friends everyone they meet, or has totally unlocked privacy settings. And they all feel similarly to us about what we're ok with having posted out there. We will post pictures and stuff, but nothing that we definitely think he'd find embarrassing later. And as he gets older, we will of course take his opinion into account as well.

I do think profiting off pics of your kids is wrong, and if people are doing it I sincerely hope that the profits are being held in trust for the child at the very least. And public shaming? Ugh. There are better ways to parent than to potentially ruin your child's future to make a point. Doesn't that fly in the face of the internet 101 lesson: 'be careful what you put online'? Shortsighted at best.

Soon2BMrsN · June 2014

I overshare (appropriate) pics of my kids through IG, FB and a blog but I seriously don't know many people (I have about 100 IG followers and 200ish FB friends) and keep my accounts private. It's mostly for my extended family, who all live out of state.

seells · June 2014

I have tons of photos of DD on fb and ig. I have high privacy settings and a low friends list which is 90% family. Our families don't have crazy amounts of friends and don't overshare pictures or info.

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