Children's right to privacy

[DownstairsMixUp]

Morning everyone,

Just a general discussion but something I see more and more of online. I've just been watching a series on Tik tok of a 26 year old who was the child of a mummy blogger. She's raising awareness on there and hoping to change parents broadcasting their children's lives as she says it has damaged her and the relationship she has with her mother.

My question is, why is there nothing stricter on protecting a child's right to a private life? So many celebrities and influencers put their child's face in full view on social media to millions of followers, broadcasting everything from bath time to milestones... am I the only one that finds it odd? I'd hate to have got to my age and scroll back and see my whole childhood online with strangers commenting on me.

Does it make anyone else really uncomfortable that this just seems to be accepted? Just because we bring a child in the world, do we own the rights to their privacy and dignity?

I started an adoption based instagram a few years ago, it now has lots of members and we now have ten users who share the account to easily provide area specific information. It is not a private account and it has a few thousand followers.

I will sometimes post something about my son on there, but it will be something like a crafting project he has completed as part of a review into the actual product etc. But I make sure not to post his face, his name, his birthday and I make sure I check backgrounds of pictures, it would be very easy to work out where we live from daily walk pictures.

One of the account users posts information that I feel is too personal, their child withholds which is very common in adopted children. I have made specific posts about withholding, how to manage it etc which is fine. But this user will talk about their child withholding. Will any child want their bowel movement or lack of to be public knowledge? No, very unlikely.

I think family vlogging will be a huge scandal. Society's not there yet but it'll blow up eventually, probably when the DC are adults.

I agree, my eldest asked me to not post photos so I don't - I then went through my social media and removed all the photos I had previously posted. I'm much more aware about the dangers online than I was years ago and I want to protect my children's digital footprint. If I want family to see I'd set up a family WhatsApp, but I can't see my kids liking that either!

Photos*

There's not a single picture of my DC on social media. I was looking through some old photos of myself as a child the other day back in the 80's. Theyre awful! The fashions, the poses, I was so awkward in them. I would be absolutely mortified if they were online.

I don’t post any photos of my child online, ever and neither does my husband (I barely use it anyway). When the time comes, I will refuse consent for his school to publish his photo on their social sites too (purely to promote the school, doesn’t do anything positive for child education!) I would also discourage him from using social media until he’s 16, when he would be mature enough (hopefully) to understand the lasting legacy of uploading your private photos to a random server owned by Facebook or Google.
It’s an area I’m very interested in, the fact that children cannot consent to their image being published yet parents make money off of their children’s image. I used to watch the SacconeJolys and have unfollowed them on this year after stopping watching at least two years ago. There’s a massive debate going on regarding the father exploiting his sons enjoyment of wearing dresses for views, clout and cash. When the children were younger it didn’t feel that bad but the older two are now 6 and 8 and it’s difficult to watch their content as it’s basically ALL about the kids and the older two especially really should be entitled to privacy. A PP made an excellent point, we all have home videos and photos of us growing up that we would rather not show our friends, or new partner, let alone strangers so the fact these children’s entire private (as far as they know) lives are available to watch since birth, is so corrupt. I enjoyed watching the vlogs when it was primarily around Jonathan and Anna (the parents) but got bored of watching their children because I’m really not interested in being a fly on the wall on little kids lives. And I have to say, I find it weird that people enjoy watching. I wouldn’t go as far as to call their viewers paedophiles but there is a creepy flavour to a habit of watching the daily lives of children who cannot consent to it or even fully comprehend it.

Bit off topic this but I don't get people (mainly celebrities but not always) who photograph themselves, their children or another family member having hospital treatment or even seriously ill. Can someone explain why people do this? I see celebs brandishing their arm with a cannula in connected to a drip or I open a magazine and see a member of the public rge photograph taken by a relative while they were very sick in hospital. I had cancer a nunber of years ago and ended up. In ICU and had numerous operations but never in a million years would any of my family have thought to photograph me in that state. Similarly I have lost very close family members and never photographed them ill in hospital. Why would you choose to do that??

@Bbq1 attention seeking

Hello! This thread is really interesting....

My name is Eugenia and I'm the founder of LETSMEMO I am passionate about building smarter and more private ways to create digital memories with our children. When I became a parent (I have two wonderful children, 5 & 7), I found myself creating many digital treasures on my phones; treasures that were more than photos - voice notes, digital drawings, playlists, walks, etc.. I wanted to keep it all and find a way to curate these moments in a beautiful way but I had nowhere to put them.

I use social media however when it comes to my children, I do not feel it is right to post anything about them. I think it is a violation no matter how difficult it is to resist showing off how proud I am as their mother. No parent would intentionally compromise their child’s identity however today’s privacy concerns are real - and will only increase in time - so we are building something for parents who want to continue to capture memories in a safe way.

LETSMEMO is taking a privacy-by-design approach, with end-to-end encryption, so you can have fun and feel safe in your online private space. We want you to build digital memories that are not monetised, memories that are owned by the users.

We are in Beta stage at the moment and looking for parents to build and test our app with us. If you are interested or want to find out more please message me or reply in this thread.

I agree with you 100% op. In recent times, privacy seems to have gone out of the window.

100% agree. I dread to think what it would be like going to school and other kids googling your potty training milestones.

I’ve also been waiting for the supernanny kids to come of age and sue.

Children are actually people.