
I’m 14, and I quit social media after discovering what was posted about me - laurex
https://www.fastcompany.com/90315706/kids-parents-social-media-sharing
======
gringoDan
I sympathize with this perspective. I too would be livid and mortified if my
family shared embarrassing photos of me in exchange for the quick dopamine hit
that validation from acquaintances provides.

I'm hopeful that in the next several years there is a pushback against social
media and the idea that for an experience to be valid, it must be shared.
There's something to be said for having an album of photos that you pull out a
couple of times a year to show a select group of others. It makes the
experience much more valuable than blasting out content for everyone to see.

Makes me think that Gen Z is much wiser than the Millennials. People coming of
age today are much more cautious than those who did 5-10 years ago (lots of
drunken party photos on Facebook, etc). They understand the consequences of
having information in the world that never goes away.

~~~
jpfed
>There's something to be said for having an album of photos that you pull out
a couple of times a year to show a select group of others.

My perhaps unreasonable hope for a Facebook killer is just a paid personal
archive of your own photos, writings, etc. with the assumption of privacy by
default.

~~~
OatsAndHoney
Have you tried iCloud / iPhone? That's what I switched over to once I quit
Facebook and Android. The iPhone is great, it's private by default, I can
share photos / albums only with the people that I want, and I create different
groups based off of different interests, trips, etc. All together with
iMessage and Notes I get pretty much everything I had with a newsfeed / blog,
all without the implications of Facebook and giving up all of my privacy.

~~~
virusduck
Same here. At first it seems a little clunky, but then I realized that was
actually a feature.

------
MattBearman
My wife and I recently had our first child, and we decided we didn't want her
to have any kind of social media presence until she was old enough to make
that decision for herself.

It's been a challenge ensuring friends and family don't post stuff about our
daughter, but reading this reinforces that we're making the right choice.

~~~
1zee
What is "old enough"?

~~~
austincheney
114\. A better question is at what age do social media participants stop being
toxic or easily offended?

~~~
t0astbread
Some never

------
scott_s
Kids realizing they already have an online presence made by the people who
were teaching them about being responsible about their online presence is
becoming A Thing. Two other stories with similar circumstances:

"When Kids Realize Their Whole Life Is Already Online"
[https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/02/when-...](https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/02/when-
kids-realize-their-whole-life-already-online/582916/)

"My daughter asked me to stop writing about motherhood. Here’s why I can’t do
that." [https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2019/01/03/my-
daugh...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2019/01/03/my-daughter-
asked-me-stop-writing-about-motherhood-heres-why-i-cant-do-that/)

~~~
ilikehurdles
That Washington post author is quite the narcisstic scumbag. I feel disgusted
reading the writing of someone so extremely self-absorbed.

~~~
LeftTurnSignal
>> My daughter didn’t ask to have a writer for a mother, but that’s who I am.
Amputating parts of my experience feels as abusive to our relationship as
writing about her without any consideration for her feelings and privacy.

This part got me. To me that article definitely makes it sound like she's a
writer first, and mother second. I just hope her child grows up to be a better
person than that, or I hope I'm misunderstanding that article.

------
DoreenMichele
I cannot imagine posting so much about a child of mine without them being
aware of it at all. I talk a lot about my sons. They know. If I feel it is a
story with sensitive information, I run it past them to see if they are okay
with me saying that.

I can't really comprehend the thinking here of the family members who did
this. They talk _about_ her but not _to_ her?

That's the opposite of "social" behavior. That's treating her like an object,
not a person.

~~~
aglavine
This. She've never seen his mom's Facebook profile in 14 years? It seems fake.

~~~
majewsky
How's she supposed to see it if she's not allowed to have a Facebook account?

~~~
aglavine
She lives with her mother 14 years and never saw her at any time posting in
Facebook. Her mother never show her pictures there from her childhood?

------
franciscojgo
I'm more surprised by the story telling and narrative of the 14 year old
author! Impressed. Pretty sure the only thing I was worrying about when 14 was
how to get past the min. word count and not use "however" so much.

~~~
Insanity
Indeed, really impressive. It also impressed me to see what she's involved in
at school:

> Sonia Bokhari is an 8th grader and a persuasive and narrative writer. She is
> also the leader of her middle school’s Gay-Straight Alliance and a member of
> the school’s Environmental Club.

She might not be the average 14yo :)

~~~
coldtea
Yeah, she might be the parent-pressured 14yo.

~~~
TremendousJudge
wouldn't surprise me considering that she has the kind of parents that post
online all the time about their kids

------
mrunkel
This seems to me (albeit as a probably completely unqualified person to have a
real viewpoint here, as a 50ish male without children) to be much ado about
nothing.

Somehow, perhaps because of the pervasiveness of social media, the sense of
self has expanded quite a great deal.

In a family, and later in public life, we don't have the right to control how
we are perceived in the public. (I know some countries in the EU have
differing views on that, but I disagree with them as well).

Just as the daughter has the right to not share herself or her life on social
media, I don't believe she has the right to demand approval of her mother's or
sister's posts.

I would argue that the mother and the sister have an equal right to share
their lives as they wish, that includes things that were given or said to them
by the daughter that is now aghast that these items were shared further.

Freedoms are always a balancing act. Every time we expand our personal sphere
of control, we are impinging on the sphere of control of someone else.

I mean, I get the sentiment, and I get that a 13/14 year old would be
embarrassed by these types of things, but that is unfortunately what life is
like. We get to control the things we say and do, but we don't get to control
what others do with it.

~~~
kyboren
> Just as the daughter has the right to not share herself or her life on
> social media, I don't believe she has the right to demand approval of her
> mother's or sister's posts.

A legal right? Absolutely not. A moral right? Absolutely.

Knowingly disclosing information about someone that that person has expressly
confirmed they would like to remain private is certainly not a friendly act.
When the parties involved are in a close relationship, this can feel like (and
in my view is) a serious betrayal. Such a betrayal can permanently damage that
relationship.

The daughter's feelings in this situation are entirely valid, and she is
entirely within her moral rights to demand her mother not violate her privacy.

~~~
oarsinsync
> > Just as the daughter has the right to not share herself or her life on
> social media, I don't believe she has the right to demand approval of her
> mother's or sister's posts.

> A legal right? Absolutely not. A moral right? Absolutely.

Depends on your jurisdiction. In some regions, the subject of the photo is the
legal owner, and absolutely has the right to control distribution.

------
wallflower
A few parents have always tried to use their kids as a means for more than
attention (fame, money, power). Now that advertisers see the influence that a
few parents have, they are rabid with dollars.

On the far left side of the power law curve of that, we have:

“Online and Making Thousands, at Age 4: Meet the Kidfluencers“

[https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/01/business/media/social-
med...](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/01/business/media/social-media-
influencers-kids.html)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19286701](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19286701)

~~~
gabbygab
You mean like the british royal family? Politicians? Movie stars? Which the
news exploits for money as well?

It's so funny how the media pushes neverending anti-social media stories and
yet exploits children themselves for money.

Is it okay when the elites and the news industry does it but not when ordinary
people do it?

~~~
linuxftw
It's important that society maintains the illusion of fame through talent. If
we decentralize our entertainment, the established political class has much
less authority.

------
JeanMarcS
I remember years ago reading an article stating that a time will come when
young adults will sue their parents for posting pictures of them younger or
stories.

Of course it was a bit extreme, but when I read that I'm afraid it might
happens.

To my big shame I'm also quoting my kids sometimes on FB. But there are no
picture of them online.

And I use FB with a pseudo and quote the with aliases only family know, so I
guess it's not as bad.

------
astura
I get mortified about some of the stuff I see parents posting about their kids
on social media. It's like they don't even realize they are living beings with
feelings of their own and not some lifeless prop. Especially when its
complaining about the kid... do you really want to publish that comment? Are
you ok with them seeing it one day?

I don't mind occasional non-embarrassing non-inappropriate pictures and
stories, but FFS, please don't live stream their entire life, it just seems so
disrespectful to the kid.

It's also uninteresting to everyone else but you and perhaps the grandparents
to boot.

------
JimBrimble35
Why quit? Why not just tell your parents to make their accounts private, or
remove the images that you're not comfortable with? I feel like there are
solutions here that don't involve delaying the parent's participation in
social media until the child is old enough to choose to accept it.

As much as this concerns the child's social media life, it's also a matter of
the parent's experience. Parents post this stuff to share, and commiserate,
and participate with other parents in the experience of parenthood. I find it
difficult to accept that this girl will grow up and privately horde all of her
children's images and information until they give consent to release it.
Teenager tend to struggle with the fact that the people around them have lives
as well.

All that said, I operate my social media very differently than this girls
parent's seem to. I prune and keep friends lists very inner circle, I never
post anything publicly, and I often show my children the pictures that I'm
posting and get them involved in the process. they won't be surprised about
social media when they become teenagers.

I think the next generation of people are just going to need to develop a
thicker digital skin.

~~~
asdff
People have been sharing wallet photos of their kids for generations now, no
one has a problem with that because you are basically saying "here's what my
kid looks like these days" or "didn't he look like uncle dave in this picture?
same nose," all very benign and also maintaining the kids privacy on their
daily life, their feelings, and embarrassments and failures that can be so
demoralizing when you are a kid. When you start religiously blogging your
child's daily life, I'd say you have an unhealthy obsession toward social
validation and it's unfair to your kid to use them to further your obsession.

~~~
JimBrimble35
I don't think it's (always) about being obsessed with social validation
though, it's a new societal norm brought about by social media. In fact it's
the _hook_ it's why people use social media at all, because you can _share
your life_ with people in a way that wasn't possible before. The raising of
children being a major part of that life. I would go as far as to say that the
children aren't actually the subject in these posts, the real subject is the
parent's life and the posts containing images and anecdotes of their kids are
a side effect.

Maybe this is an opportunity for some social media company to get ahead of
this and use facial recognition to tag people across ages. If the user decides
that they don't want their image to appear on someone else's account, they can
go through the images granularly and take them down.

I think what I'm getting at is that this is _new_. It's as new as is the
ability of a 14 year old to express their frustration with something and have
an audience of millions. I don't think the solution here is to tell parents
that it's inappropriate to post about their children online. I think the real
solution has more to do with finding a comfortable balance and set of controls
so that everyone's interests can be accounted for.

p.s. I shuddered while typing "14 year old to express their frustration with
something and have an audience of millions". The next 50 years are going to
contain some _hard_ times.

------
honkycat
I'm free of most social media. I only have a twitter, which I use to wile away
time and keep up with bands going to my local music venus.

I have considered resurrecting my social media presence lately. I live a long
ways away from my parents. I think it is kind-of nice to allow my parents to
form a para-social bond with my online presence. Just so they can see how I am
doing.

However, I keep coming back to the same mantra about social media: There is no
wisdom here. I love learning, reading, experimenting with new hobbies. I am
lifelong learner. Social media does not enhance that.

I tend to be a spitfire, and chewing out old people on facebook is NOT a good
look. I do not want my past social media posts to come back to haunt me.

Also, I get a lot of anxiety when I am on social media. Old friends, old
lovers, all of these messy complicated situations and people I have moved away
from. Dragging all of that back up... no thanks.

------
legohead
We made a rule not to post our children's faces on social media. I just had to
ask myself how I'd feel if I grew up and found a bunch of stuff on the
internet about me I couldn't get rid of.

------
chengiz
A 14 year old who is embarrassed by what their parents posted == a 14 year old
who is embarrassed by what their parents _did_ == a 14 year old.

When this girl grows up, she'll understand she was being immature and there's
nothing embarrassing about your parents posting moments about you that made
_them_ proud. Her parents seem awesome that they're respecting her wishes now.

As I write this, I'm reminded of a Louis CK bit when he describes your thought
process when you see a woman scolding her kid in public. When you're not a
parent (which seems like most commenters here), you're thinking OMG what a
terrible parent. When you're a parent, you're thinking what must that child
have done to that poor woman.

------
pard68
This really reinforces a small conversation I had on Mastodon last week about
creating mastodon communities for families (ie a family has their own private
mastodon instance). Now mom, dad, gramma, and even younger kids can
participate in social media together but not in the public eye. Maybe allow
white listing of other families' instances so gram can keep up with other
families or other grandkids not in her instance or so parents can plan stuff.

Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc are too big and too open for kids (heck, I
am a father of two and I don't feel comfortable on the platforms because they
are too public).

Also, I have no desire to see my children use traditional social media, they
are toxic and are breeding grounds for bullying.

------
uiri
_even those who post constantly are more aware than people just a few years
ago about how much information the internet is absorbing about us._

I'm about 10 years older than the author, and we _were_ aware. The Cambridge
Analytica scandal is just the straw that broke the Camel's back. That was
Facebook's MO all the way back circa 2010. It was just that most of us
teenagers at the time simply didn't care. The adults warned us the same way
they warn teens today but for the most part they didn't care about the data
mining back then either.

------
potta_coffee
I've given up on telling family to not post pictures of my kids on the
internet. I just deleted all social accounts and no talk to them. Social media
is utter cancer IMO.

------
peterwwillis
This is a pervasive problem, where 3rd parties unintentionally emotionally
effect other people with their social media posts. I was going to relate a
story about how this effects people in polyamorous relationships, but then I
realized this effects literally everyone who cares about anything strongly.
And the long memory of digital artifacts creates additional opportunities to
mess with people down the road.

------
dcole2929
It's pretty apparent the things that a kid would be embarrassed about are not
the same thing I as an adult would be embarrassed about. I'm 20+ years removed
from those events in my life where these kids aren't. To them this is recent
memory and more importantly still stuff they will get made fun of for. How
many people do you know who carried a nickname all throughout middle and high
school from one dumb thing they did when they were 8? I know some who still
have the dumb nickname 20-30 years after the fact.

This isn't child abuse by any means but it's just incredibly dumb on the parts
of the adults around them. By writing/posting about kids you make them public
figures and open them up to all the abuse anyone on the internet wants to heap
on them. And this is all happening at a time when they are going through
painfully awkward transitions and just starting to discover who they are and
want to be.

There are absolutely going to be lawsuits about this sooner than you'd think.

------
jdlyga
Facebook launched when I was in college, and we were taught to treat it as a
way of sharing pictures with your friends. We never got any training on what
to share, what not to share, how permanent an online presence is, or anything
since we were the first to use that sort of thing. It was just expected that
new parents would post everything about their kid on there. Because you had
that illusion of that it was "just for your friends". Most other social media
sites like Xanga acted that way, and were usually gone within a few years. I
think we have a lot to learn from Gen Z about the implications of making
everything public and the dangers of social media. Because I can tell you that
us millennials never learned any of that stuff except from news reports and by
making mistakes.

------
jaredcwhite
We've always been protective of our young children's presence on social media,
because of all of these concerns. (Bravo to the author for articulating them
so well!)

One of the big challenges has been other people (family members, etc.) who
want to take pictures of our kids or record some funny quote and post it on
THEIR profiles. We as the parents don't always have control over that (and
we've had to request more than once that somebody take something down they
posted). It's awkward all around, and I'm not sure what the solution is other
than developing manners as a society (just like people have been trained to
write SPOILER ALERT before they blab about a movie in comments or whatever).

------
clarkmoody
I love the idea of data locality: your home server contains your trove of
photos, videos, music, and you grant limited shares to visitors. The digital
equivalent of pulling out the photo album from under the coffee table.

This sort of idea dovetails nicely with the Secure Scuttlebutt concept that
the social network graph mirrors the physical network: you swap the latest
posts with others as you find yourself on the same local network.

Perhaps someday we will live in a more sophisticated world that relies less on
centralized cloud providers and everyone runs a home server. Stories of youth
pushing back against social media are certainly a step in the right direction.

~~~
Jaruzel
Commercialise a shiny black box that plugs into the power (like a Wifi
Extender), that:

1\. Connects to the internet

2\. uPnPs silently port 80 to itself

3\. Registers a name with a dynamic DNS service (remember those?)

4\. Has ~4GB local storage

5\. Runs a 'newsfeed' type web portal or API.

6\. Has a Phone app for easy sharing/creation of content.

Make this 100% turnkey for non-technical people and you MAY have a chance at
getting people to stop storing personal stuff 'in the cloud'. I don't hold out
much hope though.

~~~
Mediterraneo10
> uPnPs silently port 80 to itself

Besides the fact that in the post-Let’s Encrypt world we should start
expecting port 443 by default for any web service, for many ISPs running a
publicly accessible server violates the terms of service unless your contract
with the ISP is their business tier.

To make things worse, a lot of people are issued a router by their ISP where
uPnP is disabled, and they do not have access to its firmware to change this
or other settings.

~~~
Jaruzel
Yeah my bad - should have said 443, with auto-cert from XYZ provider.

------
samayylmao
This is one smart kid for that age. The critical thinking and reasoning skills
are on point. Its comforting to know that the younger generations are more
informed about the consequences of poor use of technology.

------
athenot
Very good article. However, one point stands out:

> _Despite everything that had happened with my mom and sister, I had made one
> of the most common mistakes; all of my social media accounts were public._

I've taken the opposite stance and preferred public accounts: that way I don't
post anything I'm not comfortable with being seen by the world. IMHO the false
sense of privacy setting would end up making me providing a lot more data to
networks.

------
penciljencil
When I was a child my parents would consistently tell me that I should never
put details about myself on the internet. But when Facebook became a thing it
was suddenly okay to share pictures of your birthday party with complete
strangers.

Personally, I don't feel comfortable with the idea of my photos being taken
out of context and used in a way that I wouldn't agree with. Oddly enough,
most of my friends don't see this as an issue.

~~~
asdff
When Facebook first became a thing you only added people you knew, rejecting
friend requests from people you didn't, so it didn't feel as weird to share a
group photo from your birthday party. When I first joined the site I really
only added my friends and acquaintances from school, I wouldn't even add
relatives unless they were around my age.

------
sagebird
While I think this 14 year old and story is authentic, I think this will be
misused as a motivational story to fuel Zuckerberg's new white-knighting of
privacy concerns. It's really important that Facebook be held to account for
their negative influence, and not be allowed to distract with lofty future
promises, and co-opt innocent peoples stories for cheap publicity.

~~~
sagebird
For example, it would be trivial to default content be shared to friends only.
If Zuck gave a true shit about privacy, that change could happen instantly,
and years ago.

~~~
anticensor
It was the initial default before VCs have came in.

~~~
sixstringtheory
Yup. I remember the “vote” they held that essentially gave away any further
say in how those kinds of decisions are made. “We heard you loud and clear–you
didn’t vote, you must not care, so we’ll do whatever we want with your stuff
now.” (Paraphrasing) of course they never actually intended it to be a
democratic platform and knew full well what the results would be before even
announcing it.

------
aiyodev
My wife and I don’t use Facebook or Instagram. When we have children I plan to
setup an email account for them. I’ll document their life by sending them
photos and messages as they grow up. If something ever happens to me they’ll
know how much I cared about them. When they’re old enough they can choose what
parts of their childhood they want shared with the public.

------
rangersanger
I immediately thought of the discourse surrounding Sally Mann upon reading
this. The intent is different, the medium different, but I don't think the
questions around her work have been satisfactorily resolved. If anything,
they're heightened by the ease with which non-famous artists can gain
extensive audience.

"Can a child freely give consent to be photographed, especially in vulnerable
positions including nudity, when the photographer is a parent? Do these
photographs unintentionally put children at greater risk given the reality of
pedophilia in society? Do they unintentionally encourage a sexualized view of
childhood? Does such work on any level exploit these actual children?"

[https://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-
idx?cc=mqr;c=mqr;...](https://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-
idx?cc=mqr;c=mqr;c=mqrarchive;idno=act2080.0039.223;g=mqrg;rgn=main;view=text;xc=1)

------
dwild
As much as I want to believe it's a good thing for a kid to be away from
social media, there doesn't seems to be any compelling argument for it in that
article.

It seems like fear is her only justification, which to me if anything, is the
worse reason to do anything. Being aware of the risk and mitigating it when
necessary is the right way to do it, instead of simply letting fear control
us. The strange thing is that she seems to be aware of that risk and did use
methods to mitigate it.

Her lack of social media doesn't seems to affect her though, so I guess it's
alright in her case. I know personally though that my group of friend and I
had ton of trouble to include people without social media in any event
organization, and the increased friction slowly pushed many of the ones
without it away (while the solution, which did work for some, was simply a
fully anonymous account, though I think Facebook now ban theses accounts).

~~~
ThinkBad
Maintaining a circle of friends is a pretty weak justification for social
media use. Many of my friends and I don't use social media at all and we have
zero issues coordinating events. It sounds like the real issue is that you
didn't value the connection to your friend enough to reach out to them. SMS
and phone calls are still a thing.

------
nuna
I share most videos and pics to a family chat group but after reading this I
went back and checked there were no embarrassing photos. Also just by posting,
even to a private group, who knows if the images and videos are kept forever
(whatsapp, instagram, snapchat)

------
fosco
reminds me of the onion video [0] on this from a 6 year old.

this is really challenging, I do not not have social media [1] and have not
since 2007/8 ish and yet I know that people still post things about me and
sometimes forward me an email of a picture posted at an event, dinner,
gathering. I really do not know the answer here, I look like the bad guy if I
inform others I do not want myself on there so I lose and know no way around
it. More and more I feel the only privacy that exists is between my ears.

[0] [https://www.theonion.com/6-year-old-explains-how-messed-
up-i...](https://www.theonion.com/6-year-old-explains-how-messed-up-it-is-
that-her-entire-1826840659)

[1] other than HN I suppose

------
aboutruby
Being anonymous or more likely pseudo-anonymous is very undervalued. I think
there is already a trend but in the future people are likely to have many
pseudo-anonymous identities and one public one with as few data possible and
as curated as possible.

~~~
asdff
Even Kevin Durant has burner twitter handles for flaming.

------
djklanac
Thought provoking but ultimately melodramatic. Your family posted the
equivalent of your baby book online. There are far worse things. You’ll be
fine.

------
muzani
I think a big part of this is consent. My kids know I post their photo on
Facebook/Instagram. They pick which one, and even tell me to "like" it after
it's posted.

It brings up the question of how old they need to be (my kid was about 3-4
when she started telling us to put up her photos). But I guess we can always
remove it later, and just don't put anything embarrassing up there.

~~~
kyboren
I think you're right.

How can a 3-4 year old give meaningful consent to having her biometrics
irrevocably recorded by one of the world's most aggressive and pernicious
surveillance corporations? How fully did your kids understand all the
implications of posting photos on social media before you agreed to do it?

> But I guess we can always remove it later

No. You can't. Maybe you can ask FB to stop showing the photo to other people,
and maybe they'll comply, but FB will still retain it and any data derived
from it (e.g., facial biometric data). Other people could have saved that
photo and could re-post it at any time. Or FB could have a bug and that photo
could resurface.

Once something is published on the www, there are no backsies. This is
something every parent these days needs to impress upon their children. I'm
honestly shocked that you, fellow HN poster, need to learn this lesson, too.

------
ggm
I made an X.500 OSI directory services entry for my eighteen month old child.
This was in 1993 twelve years later he had to ask me to try and delete it. It
was still popping up in searches for his name and he didn't like it. It was
remarkably hard to erase since the quipu directory was basically offline then
and the data only existed in Wayback style archives.

------
teekert
It's almost unimaginable that a 14y/o is so wise. I was going to yell "Fraud!"
but Fast Company seems trustworthy and the last sentences suggest it really
was a 14 y/o. Amazing, when I was 14 I was like an 8 y/o compared to this
girl.

------
ct0
I support this, and when I have children i know family will be asking for
photos. The plan will be to host a blog and link them to photos, for ultimate
control of who has photos of my offspring.

------
coldtea
> _When I saw the pictures that she had been posting on Facebook for years, I
> felt utterly embarrassed, and deeply betrayed._

Well, that's because you're 13, the age when kids turn blase and embarrassed
about being kids, and of the childish things they used to like.

It's not like her mother did anything specially wrong, e.g. posting the letter
to the tooth fairy, and so on.

It's only embarrassing to her because she's 13. When she's older, she will
cringe that she used to be embarrassed about such a thing.

~~~
samayylmao
I respectfully disagree. Children have a right to their own privacy from the
rest of the world and it is a parents' responsibility to respect that. My son
is only 11 months old but neither my wife, our family/friends, or myself post
pictures of him or any intimate details on social media. They can be shared
privately but not on social media.

~~~
fhood
I think it goes even deeper than that. I firmly believe in my own right to
privacy, but as an adult, I also have some understanding of the consequences
and implications of my actions, and this informs what I do, and what I share.

Children do not and cannot have this luxury. They should not be held
responsible for their choices and actions in the way that adults are, and a
part of this is ensuring that their life is not documented with the level of
permanency that is inherent in the internet.

~~~
samayylmao
Good point, I should have said "responsibility to ensure that" instead of
"responsibility to respect that". Parents have the responsibility of
protecting their child's privacy.

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foxhop
Do we think this is maybe more of a mom trait than a dad trait? I know I have
posted maybe a couple images of my children (2, 7, and 11) over the last 11
years. My wife on the other hand posts at least twice a day with images and
quotes. I wonder if woman sort of use Facebook as a sort of "shared" baby book
for their little cubs?

~~~
micael_dias
Twice a day? Don't want to be offensive but that seems very excessive. Even
for people I know on Facebook that post regularly their kids' photos I think
the maximum I see is once a week. I'm not from the US and don't follow that
many people so that might be why.

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astura
My sister in law posts baby pics, no joke, 5 times a day, minimum. It's
outrageous (IMO)

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barrkel
I feel sad that making friends online has turned into "contacting strangers".

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gabbygab
She quits social media and writes a public article in traditional media so
that people can talk even more about her?

Is this her idea or the idea of her mother who probably is friends with
someone working at fastcompany?

I'd be interested to find out how a "random" 8th grader got to write an
article for fastcompany and if she or her family has any ties with anyone at
fastcompany or even Mehta, the editor.

Also, couldn't this also be viewed as fastcompany exploiting an 8th grader for
money and agenda? And is this girl's parents any better than the social media
parents?

The internal contradictions and hypocrisy in this article is quite something
to behold.

~~~
rrauenza
The difference is consent. She (presumably) gave permission for her essay to
be published.

