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AIBU?

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Original poster

To be angry at photos at Nativity?

758 replies

MrsAnamCara · 14/12/2017 15:45

Just seen DC infant nativity. We were sent out letters, went to the office yo get tickets, had texts to remind people-all fine and well. No mention of needing permission to take photos/videos. Nothing mentioned before the start of the actual nativity performance either. The performance starts and several people whip their phones out and begin taking photos and videos but not of individual children, of all of the children on stage. It goes on throughout the performance and I can see in their view finder they are filming/recording video of 5+ children... A parent the right if the school Hall is stood filming the entire performance.

No one said they weren't allowed to but...neither was the guardian or parent of every single child asked either.

In my D's nursery, they asked for written permission, and if only one parent didn't give permission then no one was allowed to take photos or videos. Even if we were allowed, then it was photos and videos of your child only (zoom in) and if there were other children then you couldn't post it on social media and send to anyone else.

It really ruined the performance for me, as I don't know these people who are taking videos/photos of my child, I don't know where they will post them or send them to, I don't know who will see that photo or video. I did not give anyone permission to take his photo or record him?

I'm I being unreasonable to think the school should have asked for legal written permission for all children's parents or guardian's? And if some parents don't agree or give permission then that's too bad.

OP posts:
Maemae06 · 15/12/2017 19:32

All I am saying is as long as they are not posted online which as I said I wouldn’t do I like filming my children’s plays to watch back. Even watching back from 2/3 years is lovely to notice how things have changed! I completely agree that children in situations were they have been abused, are at risk there would be harm but this is only if posted online.maybe people need to stop putting theirs and everyone else’s lives online and go back to keeping our lives and especially our children’s private.

MiniMum97 · 15/12/2017 19:34

UABVU. Chill the fuck out.

Dianag111 · 15/12/2017 19:34

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Dianag111 · 15/12/2017 19:35

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

JacquesHammer · 15/12/2017 19:48

Yes I’m sure these children need to be included what I’m saying is what about us who just want to record a special moment in our child’s childhood to one day look back when we blink and they are grown

Seriously? What about you? You're comparing losing out on a video to a child who needs anonymity??

Selfishness knows no bounds does it?

Maemae06 · 15/12/2017 19:51

Oh how selfish of me to be a good parent and want precious memories of my children! How what a terrible person I am!!!

JacquesHammer · 15/12/2017 19:53

Oh how selfish of me to be a good parent and want precious memories of my children! How what a terrible person I am!!!

If your yardstick for parenting is taking a vid of your kids nativity then your standards are very low.

I have no videos of my DD in her nativity and harvest. Why? Because there's a child in her class who needs her safety more.

And if I insisted or requested that girl be pulled out so i could get a video? I wouldn't just be selfish, I'd be a fucking idiot.

cantkeepawayforever · 15/12/2017 19:54

If you can have 'precious memories' of your children (memories, of course, are in your head, not in a camera) without compromising the safety of another child, that is fine.

Arrangements that make that possible, e.g. school -taken photos and films that are carefully edited, then made public, are a brilliant way forward.

Personal filming that could jeopardise another child's safety - and in the extreme, their life - is NOT a good way forward. Are you genuinely saying that having to have your own pictures of the Nativity is more important than another child's safety?

Bobbybobbins · 15/12/2017 19:55

I don't think I have ever read so many selfish, thoughtless posts on a thread before. How depressing Sad

cantkeepawayforever · 15/12/2017 19:58

A really, really good way of making proper memories is to genuinely watch a performance with full attention while it happens live.

I have brilliant memories of every performance my DC have been in ... even though the vast majority couldn't be filmed for copyright reasons, and i have a couple of 'all cast but with a couple of children carefully removed' photos.

It does seem to me that the insistence of filming, and the focus on phone not on the stage, actually gets in the way of making memories, and the digital picture / filming has to take their place.

My DBs, my DPs and I can play the 'do you remember' game about our childhood for hours, without a single picture of video...because, well, we remember it.

LouLouLove · 15/12/2017 20:00

We are allowed to take videos / photos but are always told that we are not to post them on social media, I think that seems fair enough!

cantkeepawayforever · 15/12/2017 20:02

LouLou,

It is fair enough if everyone obeys it to the letter. However, it isn't a robust enough risk control measure if a child is genuinely at high risk, because - as this thread demonstrates - there will always be those who don't think it means them.

MiaowTheCat · 15/12/2017 20:02

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Maemae06 · 15/12/2017 20:08

Well I think that is common sense seems as you know about this child who is at risk. If this was the case at my school then obviously we wouldn’t film! Surly that is common sense but to say I am selfish for wanting to record these moments is ridiculous! It’s like saying why take any photos or films of our children we should all just remember...well I’m afraid to tell you I forget and sometimes I can watch these things from a few years ago and hear my child’s voice how it was and just love it! Seriously your making out I’m evil but wanting to take a video and keep it purely for me and my family to watch it in years to come is not a crime!

Chimera246 · 15/12/2017 20:09

I don't think I have ever read so many selfish, thoughtless posts on a thread before. How depressing sad

This thread is repeated every year. And every year, the same responses.

It really does give a glimpse as to how selfish and self centred some people are.

reallyanotherone · 15/12/2017 20:09

We are allowed to take videos / photos but are always told that we are not to post them on social media, I think that seems fair enough!

How do you police that though? There’s a parent at dc’s school —who is a foster carer and should fucking know better— who always posts the photos on social media. Publicly as she has no privacy settings and her profile is completely open. Even though she has been told several times not to.

You can tell people not to, but it only takes one selfish idiot and before you know it a childs safety is compromised.

Older dc’s school has a child at risk, and phones are banned in school. You just cannot take any risks that a photo may leak out and the childs identity is out there, and there’s no taking it back. Everybody, everybody sticks to this rule.

Think about it- if that happened it’d be a new school, new foster carers, possibly a new area for a child that has already had a shitload of disruption and fear.

If anyone can’t understand that and thinks that their “memories” are more important than a childs life, and no, i’m not exaggerating, then you are a worthless human being.

myrtleWilson · 15/12/2017 20:13

maemae - but you didn't come on the thread in your first post and acknowledge that safeguarding is paramount but that in your school x is the way it is managed... you came on the thread in your first post and declared you don't get why people have a problem with it... and actually your first post was about your right to film (and other children should not participate in the performance) - not your right to film but not put on social media.

Chimera246 · 15/12/2017 20:13

Maem

You should direct your wrath at people who cannot be trusted not to post images/videos on social media.

99% of the time, parents with concerns around photos/videos wouldn't give a shiny shit if it could be 100% guaranteed that those images wouldn't be plastered all over the internet

But it can't, because people don't want to take those images just for their own personal use.

They want to upload it to Facebook for the likes. Hun.

RaspberryOverload · 15/12/2017 20:21

Chocolate254

I have no footage of my eldest in any of his school plays because of a ban of footage and photos because of someone objecting, Its totally annoying even not being able to zoom in on your own child and film them in their school play and a memory I wont be able to relive over again by watching it.

I'm 49. My parents also don't have fottage or photos of me performing at school. But we are still perfectly able to relive those memories when we chat, etc.

ReggaetonLente · 15/12/2017 20:21

A really, really good way of making proper memories is to genuinely watch a performance with full attention while it happens live.

Hear hear!

Pretty sad that some people can only watch things through a screen.

squeezedatbothends · 15/12/2017 20:25

Our child's school policy states that we are allowed to take photos/film but that we mustn't share any images on social media that have any children other than our own in them. That seems fair enough. Though how they police it I don't know. It's understandable that people want a record of this special moment though isn't it?

riceuten · 15/12/2017 20:36

I am tired of

a) watching school performance via a veritable forest of arms and recording equipment, together with multiple exhalations of breath from people whose child I have accidentally obscured by breathing or moving slightly BUT
b) equally sick of the manufactured hysteria of people who claim that the recording of children on stage is somehow complicit with paedophilia, child abuse and the like, requiring parental consent going back 5 generations

cantkeepawayforever · 15/12/2017 20:51

equally sick of the manufactured hysteria of people who claim that the recording of children on stage is somehow complicit with paedophilia, child abuse and the like, requiring parental consent going back 5 generations

Has anyone on here done this? I don't think that consent is the issue - especially as most parents sign a blanket photo consent when their child starts school. It's obeying rules that may be put in place to protect the vulnerable, whose picture + location could put them at risk when placed on social media that is the issue.

Maireadplastic · 15/12/2017 20:56

Riceuten, you are the first person to mention paedophilia here. Maybe you are the 'hysterical' one.

Nanny0gg · 15/12/2017 21:04

@Maemae06
ll I am saying is as long as they are not posted online which as I said I wouldn’t do I like filming my children’s plays to watch back. Even watching back from 2/3 years is lovely to notice how things have changed!

Then bloody film at home! There's nothing that special about filming 5 seconds of your kid singing Away in a Manger, wearing a tea towel that you can't live without!

I wish it was the law that only schools can film or photograph at school events. Then they can make money, children are safe and I don't have to watch a play through a stupid woman waving her phone in front of my face!

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