Dear Kid,
I have an opinion.
(I trust that doesn’t shock you senseless.)
I just read an article about a grandmother who was “greatly inconvenienced” by her daughter-in-law not wanting her (grandma) to post pictures of the infant granddaughter on Facebook. Actually, I think the word the g’ma used was “hardship.”
Are. You. Kidding. Me.
It’s no secret that I love social media. So much so that over the last umpteen years people have (more than once) suggested an intervention. (I have cut waaaay back as my Twitter followers will attest. But that’s neither here nor there.)
It’s wonderful to be able to connect to friends, long lost friends, relatives who—BSM (before social media)—would have been only vaguely familiar names. But most of us also connect beyond people we know really well. I’ve made friends on social media who I’ve never met IRL.
There is no such thing as “privacy” on social media. I don’t care how tightly you lock something down, it’s out there, it’s public.
And if parents don’t want baby’s (toddler’s, child’s) pix making the rounds, I say good for them. Not that sharing pictures is inherently bad. But parents get to make those choices.
Grandparents get to send emails to real friends with all the pictures they want.
If parents say “here are the publicly approved photos”, grandparents need to stick by that.
This is NOT an issue for grandparents to intervene, argue, request a special dispensation, or fret about. It’s the parents’ choice.
And if the grandparents really, really disagree, the solution is obvious.
Buy the kid a drum set.
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