It’s one thing to be a parent. It’s another thing to be an influencer. But what happens when an influencer starts putting their child all over social media? Is it harmless? What about your typical sharenting, sharing photos of your kid on social media, is this a problem?
By the age of five, the average modern child has 1500 photos of them online. What does this mean for them and their future? As social media grows up and scientists study the phenomenon, the outcomes from its use are becoming clearer.
When deciding for yourself, it’s important to remember that there are no benefits to the child by putting them online. There could be benefits for you, the parent, but there are none for the child themselves- only a long list of possible poor outcomes. How you manage this is up to you.
Paedophiles on the Internet
It’s hard to quantify the danger presented by online paedophiles, but it exists. It’s estimated that 80% of the dark web traffic is linked to child sexual abuse. Is this the risk that media plays it out to be? Will your kid be abducted and sold into a sex trafficking ring? Unlikely. But why put photos up in public when you could have better privacy settings, or share photos directly and privately with loved ones?
Meta found that 500,000 child Instagram accounts have ‘inappropriate’ interactions every day. Yuck. But how can your kid, sitting adorably on a cushion, be viewed as sexual? In the mind of a sexual predator, virtually anything can be sexual. Eating a banana, wearing a skirt, or dancing, can all be viewed as exciting. Worst case scenario, over time and repeated viewings, the individual could become infatuated with the child, track your IP or use the identifying information you posted, and find your child.
Paedophiles use the internet for four main reasons.
- Traffic child pornography
- Locating children to target
- Engaging in inappropriate sexual communication with children
- Communicating with other paedophiles
A 2001 study showed that one in five youths aged 10 to 17 years had been sexually solicited online. And this is more than 20 years ago. With the increased speed of access and vast amounts of accessible content, you can assume things have not gotten better.
Psychology of Being a Child on Social Media
Being constantly in the public eye, the child never gets to be a child. They’re always being dressed, performing appropriately, and having no time just being…. A kid. That relationship between Mum and Dad and kid becomes more of a manager-employee relationship, which can lead to the child resenting the parents in later years.
A study from 2015 found these ‘influencer’ children may not be able to form their own identity, instead viewing themselves as an extension of their parent.
More worryingly, children growing up being published online may never grow out of the ‘invisible audience’ egocentrism. They will believe everyone is watching them. This can result in never being their true selves, always anxious, feeling like they are the centre of attention.
Artificial Intelligence and Facial Recognition
I think it’s important to note that tech people such as Zuckerberg don’t share photos of their kids online (or, if they do, it’s highly selectively). AI is being trained to recognise faces, to track protestors, spy on individuals, and a whole host of other things you really don’t want your kid exposed to. Mass surveillance is a perfectly reasonable concern, especially in countries where there are less laws to protect individuals, or where the government is questionable.
By the time today’s toddlers are teenagers, things are going to be so much more sophisticated. Technology, which is already ‘in the wrong hands’, can and will be used against us.
Identity Fraud
Barclays Bank say that by 2030, there will be 7.4 million incidents of identity fraud every year resulting from parents sharing photos of their children. Putting your kid online makes them a target for fraud. They know your kid’s name, their birthdate (Happy 5th Birthday! You post), place of birth, mother’s maiden name, schools they attended, home addresses, pet names… You’re setting them up for identity fraud.
Lack of Informed Consent
What if your child doesn’t want to be online?
There’s a reason that there’s a minimum age to have a social media account. Young kids or teens don’t realise the ramifications of being all over social media. In fact, most adults truly don’t either.
You cannot truly delete anything from social media. Once it’s on the internet, it’s there for life. Imagine as a teen, a photo your parent posted of you coming to light, and how damaging that could be to you. This could lead to bullying and problems with psychological development. It’s also important to note that bullying from peers will happen for every kid in the world, but bullying from all over the world, and adults, is especially tough.
Their future employer or university, may well Google your child in order to make decisions about who they hire or admit. Who knows how our previous actions will look in the future; a political stance you as an adult had impacting your child’s future?
Focus on Appearance
Photos on social media and teaching a kid that their appearance is the most important thing about themselves is a door to disaster. It makes kids, especially females, more prone to anxiety, depression, and self harm, and suicide. And that’s just from simply being online.
Focusing on their appearance; having them appear ‘dressed’ in a certain way, praising them for their appearance, and getting this constant feedback on their physical appearance can lead to lowered resilience. The kid’s identity becomes linked to external ‘likes’ and follows, and external validation from strangers. This means they don’t have intrinsic validation. A clinical a forensic psychologist notes these kids are at an increased risk of significant emotional trauma or PTSD as they get older.
When we constantly tell someone they are attractive, or value them only for that, we are letting them know their appearance is important. That the way they look is more important than her (because we don’t do this to boys) intelligence, kindness, strength, curiosity, or other qualities. A study interviewed parents 24 hours after their child was born, and parents were more likely to call their girl child cute or beautiful than they would a boy. What’s worse, is that we can’t really change our appearance; it’s something we have little to no control over. How will this girl feel when the only thing she’s valued for, is something she can’t control or change? Powerless. On the fast track for dieting at age five, makeup at ten years, new boobs at 21, and botox at 25.
One young lady, after a lifetime of her mother posting photos of her, decided her only way to have a future is to have an OnlyFans account. She had no idea of her value or intelligence or skills outside of her appearance; she thought people would only like her for how she looked.
Why Do Parent Influencers Do This?
If you have good privacy settings and post cute photos of your adorable children for your friends and family, that is awesome. If a video of your kid saying ‘f*cking goat’ online goes viral, it’s fine, these things happen. Good work, keep it up.
There’s an influencer I follow online. She acts out her kid’s antics, and then plays the video ‘for receipts’ with the kid’s face blurred out. She has millions of followers and is absolutely fulfilling her desire for attention in a perfectly healthy way. It’s a valuable service, these parenting influencers who create light-hearted content. We don’t feel so alone, and parenting is a task that could benefit from not being taken with such vile seriousness.
The influencers who post content of their kids to the world are doing it for different reasons. Trading on the popularity and appearance of their kids, they are very different altogether.
- They want to get brand deals and free stuff; they’re making money from their kids
- They may want to show how much of a great parent they are, how responsible, patient, loving, and generally excellent they are, showcasing themselves. This is often what mothers do, to validate themselves, as mothers are frequently made to feel bad about themselves. Largely, this is simply impression management.
- They are using the clicks, likes, and engagement to feel good about themselves. A photo of a cute kid gets more engagement than a photo of their cat, so they post more. Then they need that hit of feel-good dopamine again and again. It’s like Munchausen’s-By-Proxy; you’re using the kid to get attention for yourself.
What’s The Gold Standard For Your Children Online?
As a parent, you need to make the best choice for your child. Best practices can include:
- Keep your accounts private
- Refrain from posting any content featuring your child, especially anything where they are undressed in any form
- Maintain strict rules about not giving any identifying information about your child so they can’t be tracked
- Think about everything you post:
- Is this in the best interests of the child?
- Will my child be positive about sharing this image online when they are older?
- Could this maybe be embarrassing for them when they are older?
- Am I compromising their privacy or safety?
- Your child should not own a smart phone or their own social media account until they are at least 13 or 14. Depends on the child’s understanding of risks and their rational thinking skills.
There is not one single positive for the child being on social media. But with mindfulness, respect, and being very cautious with your privacy settings, you can share photos of your kid (who, lets face it, is super cute and incredibly smart) safely and responsibly.
