Project Faceless

[milandahhhling]

Do you feel strongly about keeping pictures of your children or children's faces off of social media? And if so, what are your reasons for this? Just curious.

I do. I very rarely put pictures of my children on social media. It is to preserve their privacy while they are under the age of consent.

Also I don't want to risk images of my children being used for bad things - eg pornography, or less sinister but things like marketing. In fact, because there could be purposes that I haven't even thought of, I am erring on the side of caution, and keeping things as private as possible.

I am not a showing off sort of person, so don't feel the need to show images of our holidays to random people.

Yes. I don't post pics on Facebook as I don't want the images reproduced.

Also I want the dds to grow up with privacy. They can make their own decisions about sm when they are older.

It's not compulsory.

No pictures of my daughter's face on the internet - it's non-negotiable, my husband has the same rule for himself. The internet is forever, and she should be able to choose what parts of her life end up on it.

Interesting points of view thank you 
@Changethetoner what age are you thinking that your children could reasonably consent? And what will you do about them having sm accounts etc on their own phone? If you don't mind me asking? No judgement just genuinely interested!

I have never put baby DD's image on the internet. For the reasons other posters have staged.

Bumping in case there's anyone else out there. Or anyone feel differently?

I’ve decided not to put my son on social media. I have a few reasons, basically as follows:

1. I want him to have some control over his digital presence. Many people are embarrassed by the content they put on social media several years ago when reminded of it. I don’t want to be responsible for making my son feel that way. I also want him to learn healthy, age appropriate boundaries about social media and I feel it would be hypocritical for me to deny him SM accounts at the age of 10, for example, if I had regularly posted his picture on my own accounts.

1. I am not at all hysterical about paedophiles but there have been documented instances of pictures of children being taken from SM accounts and doctored to resemble images of child abuse to be sold online. Even a small risk of that is too much imo.

1. I have several social media contacts who share so much of their children online that without ever having met the children in question I know their names, birthdays, favourite foods, schools, addresses etc. I think that’s concerning from a child safety POV: the more a person can discover about your child online the easier it is for them to gain access or gain your child’s trust.

1. This one is purely selfish, but I find it a bit dreary when a friend has a baby and it is suddenly the only thing on their social media accounts. My son is the most endlessly fascinating and joyful thing in the world to me, but I know fine well no one else is as interested. I don’t want my social media to become exclusively baby content.

Totally agree with all points above.

My own personal reasons come from previous child loss and knowing how it feels whilst grieving to be confronted with happy images of children everywhere you look.

I think it's nice to consider that others may be hurting that they cannot have what you do

Fully agree with @Terracottasaur.

I sympathise with the child loss theme too. That and all sorts of other triggers. I just can't join in.

I've taken a break from fb but I can only imagine what it's like just now.

I read on here back along that fb could exacerbate bullying when the kids are older. Specifically if bullies trawl primary school fb sites for old pix. I won't allow my dd school to post their pics on fb. They can sling their hook.