Parents who think rules don't apply to them

[mintinbox]

Just went to the harvest festival assembly at primary school where my kid was performing. The whole school was.

Announcement at the beginning no photographs or filming please turn your phone off.

Smug bitch in the second row filming the whole thing on her phone. A woman in front of her was caught taking a photograph and told not to by a member of staff (not made to delete it though) and said "oh I didn't know" of course you knew.

I have reasons for my child to be on social media with her school name attached and I'm sure I'm not the only one in the country who feels this way either.

Of course I didn't say anything to the filming mother as my child could be in a class with hers for years and so frictions are best avoided

I'm absolutely raging though.

Would i be ur to not allow my child to ever participate in school assembly's plays or anything like this again because of some selfish ignorant twat?

Do you think children who are in care, who live in refuges, who are adopted deserve to have the same education as your children?

Do you think children who are in care, who live in refuges, who are adopted deserve to have the same experiences in school as your children?

Do you think children who are in care, who live in refuges, who are adopted deserve to have the same level of safety in school as your children?

When I was a child my father battered my mum until he knocked her teeth out. We moved hundreds of miles away and went to a refuge in a town we had no connections to. I was settled in a school, happy. My mother naively sent a photo of me to my grandma and it go into my father's hands. Weeks later he turned up at my school.
This was in 1993, way before social media - imagine how easy it would be for a friend of a friend to like a photo and for it to show up on the timeline of an abusive parent and for them to be at the school the next day.

I never, not a day in my life felt safe at home. I felt safe in school, until that day when I was 10. I lost my childhood.

Your need to have a photo of your child jumping about dresses as a leaf does not now and will never trump the need of a child's safety.

Before you all carry on shouting at me, I do not contravene these rules myself, I merely don't like them. There - you can carry on shouting now

I think the no photography thing is really annoying. It's all a bit precious

You realise some of these children, who can't be photographed, have been sexually/physically abused by very dangerous people who will attempt to harm them further if they find them? They are at a real risk of being kidnapped, abused or killed if they are found.

I missed everything in DS1's reception year which was a shame.

TBH now that I can go to these kinds of events, the reality is that my view is of someone else's shoulders and their giant furry hood and sound of younger siblings, but at least DS knows I turned up.

While it's nice to have a photo of the event, it's far more important that other children are kept safe.

We are allowed to take a picture of our own child afterwards. I make sure that any other faces in the background are covered if I'm sharing.

Not everyone has tight privacy settings. It is possible for people to have mutual contacts, especially if there are public or friends of friends settings. When I "friended" a school mum, she wondered how the heck I knew her cousin from the opposite end of the county... we met from a mutual hobby before I met her. What if there was a child protection issue there? If she'd blocked that relative, she wouldn't have seen that they were a mutual "friend". If I showed a picture of DS with his school mate, it's not that hard to work out where he goes to school, and there are children where this is a genuine risk of harm.

I would just point out that [ ] a mother who is feeling bad enough to have to work full time,

Yes that was me

Some mums are in hospitals which makes life pretty shit for their children, and they feel even worst that she hasn't seen them perform

Yep that was me too. Incidentally three of your categories would also have applied to DH - fathers are also interested in these things.

You could at least show a little bit of understanding of what it feels to be on their side

I was in two categories of 'their side', DH was in three.

Why would you assume people concerned about child safety are not also the people who cannot always attend these events? The safety of other children doesn't trump my or DH's desire to film the event.

Oh grow the hell up. Ok, the staff may have said that parents weren't allowed to film but really, does it have anything to do with you and affect your enjoyment of your own child's performance. Personally, I think it's absolute bollocks that as a parent I'm told not to film my child in a play so I do it anyway. I want to document as much of my child's life as possible, including school, and no one is going to tell me otherwise.

Oh good grief. There are children in most big schools who are at risk of being located by someone who shouldn't know where they are especially in cases of fostering or adoption after abuse.
And those individuals may well be stalking local school names on social media hoping to find the children or possibly their parent.
We all know this because it's been spelled out, not only on this thread but I'd bet in multiple school letters, like mine do.
Anyone who ignores the rules and puts a child at risk just because they want a video of their kid is horrendously entitled.
And the argument that the overseas parent or ill grandmother doesn't get to then see the child doesn't stand up. If they're only seeing a video of a school play once a year instead of regular skyping or videos made at home, then that's really not the fault of school rules.

What I disagree with is the "it doesn't matter why, those are the rules" attitude, when it would be really simple for someone from the school to get up before the performance and explain why the rule exists

It would be simple. However it doesn't work. The parents who ignored the school rule not to publish on social media (where it was very clearly explained why this was a rule) also ignored the staff request with explanation at the beginning of the event. Which is why so many local schools shifted to banning photography altogether.

A question for those who are so intent on filming this stuff.

How many time have you watched your graduation video, or a video of you in a school play if you're young enough for camcorders to have been commonplace? How many of your relatives cherish these films and watch them, ever?

The safety of other children doesn't trump my or DH's desire to film the event.
Is this genuine? Of course a child's safety trumps your desire to film something.

So, as one of "those" parents who does film my child and upload it social media, I'm entitled? Utter crap! A lot of my family love abroad so I film my child and then share it on Facebook, but my privacy setting last are set to close friends and family only.

I think Doseydoe takes the prize for the vilest poster so far. But she does illustrate that these policies are likely to be ineffective.

Social media is a huge worry for adoptive parents. I know that I can only protect my child for so long - when she is a teenager she will doubtless be searching for her birth family online, and she will uncover content that will be traumatic for her. That is just one of many realities I took on when I became her mother. It would just be nice if she could enjoy a few years of primary school without fear of this first...

so I film my child and then share it on Facebook, but my privacy setting last are set to close friends and family only

And if a child who "mustn't be filmed" is there? If you override that then yes, you're an entitled prat. And if your school has a "no social media" rule and you still do it you're an entitled prat

The safety of other children doesn't trump my or DH's desire to film the event.
Is this genuine? Of course a child's safety trumps your desire to film something.

Actually that is the exact opposite of the point i was trying to make

It should say my or DH's desire to film the event doesn't trump another child's safety!

I want to document as much of my child's life as possible, including school, and no one is going to tell me otherwise.

At my DD's school if you ignore the rule one time they will delete the footage for you. If you do it a second your child will be barred from every performance.

In my drama you don't even get one strike.

A lot of my family love abroad so I film my child and then share it on Facebook, but my privacy setting last are set to close friends and family only.
Until one of them downloads it and later pops it on Youtube ....

you really have no understanding of how it works

I wonder (hope?) if these entitled parents just don't understand that the risk is real - maybe it sounds a bit like 'paedo on every street corner' to them, unless and until they know about a specific threat to a specific child. Posters have said as much on previous threads - "You should come and explain to me how your children is at risk" - but of course we can't do that, and the school can't identify individual children and break their anonymity. I suspect many of these posters have just had easy, safe lives and think we are precious drama llamas who just enjoy being at the centre of a drama.

Oh grow the hell up. Ok, the staff may have said that parents weren't allowed to film but really, does it have anything to do with you and affect your enjoyment of your own child's performance.

Well it could well affect her enjoyment of her own child if that child comes to harm because they are spotted on that film by dangerous person they were being hidden from. Do you think people want to live like this? Unable to take simple enjoyment from sharing a photo? Scared of being found by someone who will harm them or worse? Someone needs to grow up but it certainly isn't OP

In the situation at DCs school, the children were relatively safe while the problem person was still in prison, but once they were released it was very VERY strict
until they got jailed again for something else !

Presumably the same parents that think the no parking signs outside of schools do not apply to them because they are SPECIAL . Unfortunately what it does do is give their children the message that they can also ignore any rules that they don't like . One of the big problems with parents bobbing up and down taking pictures of a performance is that it is very distracting for the children on stage and the other parents but hey they are SPECIAL so tough on everybody else there

I do have an understanding. It's health and safety gone mad. Personally I couldn't give two hoots of another parent catches my ds on film whilst filming their own child at our school play. My ds is fully dressed, not placed in an inappropriate position and is just as "at risk" as all children are.

Let me put this plainly (to the people saying they will film regardless of rules) how would you respond to a fellow parent coming up to you after a performance and saying please don't put that online it will directly put my child at risk of physical abuse or abduction what would you do?

I almost feel like schools need to be blatant and send an email with some kind of case study about what has and does happen to children BECAUSE of this rule breaking.

To those who say anyone who doesn't want their children to be filmed they should not permit them to take part, I will reverse this and say if anyone insists they should be able to film their kids in anything they do then they are the ones who should remove their children.

Not to mention that removing a vulnerable child advertises the fact that they are in the vulnerable category to people who have no need to know.

I think the no photography thing is really annoying. It's all a bit precious

There are parents like us who have every reason to film our children in concerts as they are working at a very high standard, are super talented.
It would be lovely to have a library full of her school performances, film them so that absent family could watch, but we can't.

The reason we can't is for the protection of children and if we did film we would be likely to put a vulnerable child in danger.
Nothing is worse than this, including watching your kids in a thrown together school production.

People who do this should have their equipment confiscated until they have images removed.

It's so sad to see that as a society we cannot be arsed to protect vulnerable children from serious harm because of our own wants. Or worse, deny them as close to as possible of a normal childhood just because an obnoxious parent wants to show great aunt's friend's sister's dog their child in a play.

What if that was your child at risk? Would you trust every parent in that room and whoever they share it with to not put it on social media?