Do you post pic of your children's faces online / judge people who do / don't and why ?

[sicklye]

I occasionally post pics of my kids on FB and instagram.

Maybe once or twice a year. I occasionally do stories too. Maybe 3 to 4 times a year.

I decided that if it wasn't too often, it would be fine.

Some people never post at all or some blur out the faces.

Others post daily.

What's your stance on this and what are you reasons for posting / not posting / blurring out faces ?

I don’t judge people who post on private social media accounts where it’s just friends and family that they know, but when people post on public accounts or accounts they have random people on - it’s not ok and you’re exploiting your child. I don’t post my child at all, as I think the whole concept is a bit odd. I send photos to family and friends privately.

It stresses me out when people post their children’s entire birthday, full name and what school they go to. Then they have that god awful trend on Facebook where people ask their kids questions about their ‘favourites’ and the parents post all their kids interests. Strangers can get all this information and it could be so dangerous - so why take the risk??!

I don't post any pictures online of my kids because I believe it's up to my kids as they get older how much they want to share of themselves online. Not me. I work as a secondary teacher and tl am deeply uncomfortable enthusiasm the levels of trolling and cyberbullying that seem to be the norm these days. I don't want to add fuel to any future fires

I think as @AnnieBuddyHere writes, people who do frequently post photos and other stuff about their kids must surely be doing it for some sort of approbation, however much they deny it. If you wanted to just show a photo to maybe a relative or friend you rarely see, surely you would send in a private message not on your insta or FB? Lots of people have 50 or 100 friends or more on their social media, you can't possibly know who ultimately may be able to access these images and info.

Maybe people aren't specifically doing it for the number of 'likes' or comments but it must be for some sort of recognition exposing your children's lives like that otherwise why put it out there? Many parents don't seem to think through the reality of the digital footprint they're imposing on their child. Once a person can make an informed choice then it's up to them how much, if any, of their life they want to put online but until then their right to privacy should be respected

I don't post again just due to consent / I feel cherished photos of my dc are for close family and friends only, and can be shown to my DC when they're older without every other tom dick and Harry on my Facebook having seen them

Also just anything you post on the internet no matter how private it seems you don't really know who else could share something on etc so why would I knowingly do that ...

There is one person I know who was extremely judgemental about people posting their kids online - as they found it triggering due to infertility - now they're posting their son online all the time which I do find abit hypocritical !

I rarely post my ds on social media , maybe the off shot from behind while he's walking , never his face , I don't allow anyone else to post him either. I'm just not comfortable with it.
I see a lot of people who really overshare their children online and either don't have their profiles private or have random people in their friends list. It's crazy really but I suppose people don't want to think about the consequences of it.

The thing is, the mumsnet demographic is broadly older, better educated, more middle class, mums. Those aren’t the ones who are generally posting their children’s lives all over social media. So you’re not really getting a representative response here to what happens across the wider population. If you look at this thread, probably 90% are either saying they don’t post or only post mindfully / occasionally, so you end up with a self selecting sample, and those who do post more are unlikely to admit it given some of the harsher comments.

I do, but only on IG and FB which are both very locked down in terms of privacy. I have family spread far and wide, and this way they occasionally get an update about what the kids are doing.

I'd never post anything which might be seen as embarrassing for them when they grow up a bit. Snapshots of sweet daily life only!

I do but not that often and I'm careful with my settings and the types of photos.

I don't really mind what people do individually - although do feel some pictures are very unwise (bath pics etc).

What does drive me mad is when schools, clubs, influencer foster families, etc put pictures online and just partially cover the faces of children who clearly don't have permission to be shared online (eg the picture is of six kids doing an activity, but little Billy has a smiley emoji half-covering his face, half of it is still visible, you can still see his shoes and his special personalised jumper with his initials on it).
Absolutely fine for schools, clubs etc to share photos, including online, as long as parents have given permission (and kids of a certain age too), but this winds me up so much, as clearly they haven't!