Ethics regarding Instamums and huns

[BurberryIsSo2000]

Homeisthecalm here, I think it's suitable to start a new ethics thread.

Since clearly, the one from yesterday isn't really about ethics but Clemmie.

Thanks all,

Keep it as nice or as stingy as you like

I'll start off by saying things should be clearly marked 'ad' or 'gifted'

Although the term gifted gives me the rage

@boredandtired I can never quite work her out, ok her husband works, but they live like they’ve won the lottery

@keepitwonky true. He does a lot of work himself on the houses and I've always really quite liked her, maybe you just grow tired of ads or accounts? A lot of the posts lately have been ads, weekends away, clothes etc lots of things featured in the house must be gifted or partnerships but I don't think she's very clear and I don't watch stories daily which is where she puts a lot of her ads.
They do seem to live pretty well, so I wouldn't have thought she needed free towels... but maybe I'm wrong!

If you follow a few you see the same stuff being advertised on them all. I've seen the towels a few times.

So if people are turned of by the smugness/unrelatable life styles, not to mention parenting choices, (use of children in adverts) that people like the meldrums are all about..... why on Instagram are there only positive comments?! people positively fawning over them, I don't get it, nobody appears to even question what they put out there.

Do they delete all negative comments? To the point that they are so self righteous that they won't accept even questioning on their choices.....that they choose to paste across the web!

The bubble has really burst hasn't it. All my interior folks are getting stick now. And really biting back - GreenSofa and Woods etc. It's all a bit boring, especially when the bite back comes with a pic of Those sandals. I think the interiors feeds have been ruined. Why are they now all showing their faces/kids/mundane day to day. Have they all been getting really bad advice from somewhere? I want to see interiors! My only solution is to go to those with less than 5k followers.

Wearelocal I have a small insta acct where I post pics of nice things. I have a few random followers whom I don’t know but that’s fine as I don’t post anything identifying and certainly no pics of my children. If someone follows me I always check their follower score and if it’s in the thousands I often won’t follow back as I know they’re doing the follow to unfollow trick which I find so fucking rude and I’m so cynical about it now! Like you I much prefer small genuine accounts which are clearly just created with love for aesthetics. I hate the big business accounts these days, I find them utterly boring.

You now how when you buy a magazine and it’s all ads? That’s what an insta feed looks like when all you follow are big accounts. By just following the small, non business accounts I feel like I’m just getting the interesting editorial and none of the chaff.

They delete the negative comments or ignore them as the hoards of sycophantic fan girls jump in to defend them. There can be no critical thinking at all apparently. I used to follow a lot of them...i now don't.

Stilldazed the impression I get from the posts I've read is that the negative comments are done by DM. The keenies are fawning in comments because they want to noticed.

Instagram used to be so lovely - a great forum for creatives and people with genuine interests. My photographer friend introduced me to it but even she doesn’t post on it now! It’s now so tacky and commercialised

Friendly you're so right. I think the accounts got big without me noticing. Also re interiors because the big accounts are so ad heavy they are all showing the same stuff. I really don't want to see see another wall hanging or succulent from Sainsbury's! That is not inspring!

Wearelocal I unfollowed most interiors accts recently - couldn’t stand another pic of the same green sofa, man in turban print or weird zig zag rug again! The time and energy - and money - that must go in to constantly trying to find new angles of your house must be exhausting!

My favourite interiors ‘grammer, who had a large following but was so unique and creative and never seemed to be hawking anything but her own sideline business stuff (I think she started using insta to promote her products) has recently left 😢

There’s another v individual one but her stories are full of (unmarked) ads for tat from Argos and La Redoute, which seem to be the most unlikely brands she would ever buy for her home.

so they want to create the impression that everyone thinks they are great and everything they do is just awesome....so fake, so delusional.I am so naïve I never imagined they deleted all negative comments...that must be a full time job for some of them!

Anyway, I'm unfollowing the meldrums, not just because of the ads and the fact that I think that some of their choices are damaging to their kids. It's the smugness......too much!

Friendly lol yes that bloody sofa! Old skool but I've started buying World of Interiors again. It is a thing of beauty and the ads don't bother me. There's no kids, no holidays and no high street shitty merch polluting it.

I don't understand the meldrums. I'd never heard of them before. They are utterly dull aren't they?

Blimey just seen the teepee 'ad' on an interior account! It's very uncomfortable and is just ... bizarre! I mean ffs.

Can someone tell me where the teepee ad is, I'm dying to see it now!

Wearelocal...Sooo dull, neither work other than Instagram seem to think having 3 children makes them interesting.They appear to think that going on package holidays makes them travellers and adventurers ...They use their children heavily for advertising revenue and the content is vacuous to say the least...I have unfollowed, but it still beggars believe they can have such an affluent lifestyle whilst neither works as side from influencing.

@stilldazed but he's so proud of her because she works so hard vlogging so he can play golf and share school/nursery/coffee drop off. Just so weird.

The teepee ad....oh dear. What on earth were they thinking? That's terrible.

Instamums are particularly bad for claiming that they love ‘adventuring with my family’ when they are generally off to the seaside for fish and chips rather than scaling the Andes. No problem with that and I might use it within my family but it just feels really twee. Like ‘awesome’, ‘adventure’ has been thoroughly devalued!

I don't get the whole 'oh, that's so brave' arguments when it comes to taking kids out of school to travel, tbh. It's not 'brave', it's a no-brainer. If you can afford to take a couple years off piste to travel and learn about the world with your family, more power to you. Do it. But it's not 'brave'.

learn about the world in kids club, on a package holiday, where you don't leave the resort and eat pancakes..

I guess if they get travellers diarrhoea they might learn a valuable lesson from that...

Also, if your holiday is free, why do you need to go term time? You can't argue that it's the only time you can afford. Kids club is not really culturally educational either. I remember taking ours to France and OH making the kids traipse round about 300 menhirs (standing stones) and god knows what else. No bloody kids club insight!

Because the travel co.s send instas on off peak hols when the resorts aren't full? Remember the rainy season Caribbean hol or windy season Portugal resort?