Mummy bloggers using kids to feed their own ego

A parent who posted about how few “likes” her son is getting on social media has revealed a bizarre and distasteful need for approval from strangers, writes Louise Roberts.

In the combat zone that is motherhood, what kills you inside about your child also drives you to nurture, educate and then send them out into world to travel their own highway.

Deep within those “What Ifs” and worry is a more insidious element we dare not talk about. That your precious child will get hurt, ill — or even die.

So at what point did social media endorsement become the pivotal ambition, with life or death seriousness, of family life?

This week a mummy blogger posted a stupid comment about her young son, the internet devoured itself and she went into hiding, possibly chastened but no doubt bewildered.

It was the caption that blew up the joint via an Instagram post of a birthday child, even though US-based writer Kate Bower rather disingenuously claimed she was social media-ing her son to make a point about social media.

Bower wrote about one of her five children — six year old Weston. Mum put him in the stocks because he statistically underperformed. On social media, of course, the only metric that counts.

“Guys, I am gonna be perfectly honest,” Bower wrote. “ … Instagram never liked my Munchkin and it killed me inside. His photos never got as many likes.

Kate Bower’s post about son Bower’s “performance” on social media caused a backlash. Picture: Instagram

“Never got comments. From a statistical point of view, he wasn’t as popular with everyone out there.

“Maybe part of that was the pictures just never hit the algorithm right.

“Part might be because he was “the baby” for a very short amount of time … And people like babies. I say all that because I want to believe that it wasn’t him … that it was on me.

“My insufficiency caused this statistical deficit because obviously my Munch should get ALL the love and squinty eyes are totally adorable.”

There we have it — the coalescence of the Kardashian. Taking what is slavishly absorbed online and merging it with real life. And all the while creating a false sense of reality and teaching kids that it’s popularity they should aspire to.

Out there in social media there’s babble about self-righteous breastfeeding and why your child should be vegan and there’s juxtaposing the “importance” of social media likes with what it means to be a success in life.

That is, the key markers of self-esteem are clicks, likes and shares not a kind heart and decent work ethic.

Childhood has become one of unwitting digital documentation because kids, well, they largely don’t have a say in it as Ego Mummy weaponises them to promote.

It’s a bizarre and distasteful need for the endorsement of strangers. Privacy is binned and now transparent lives are paraded on loop for degustation and approval.

Kate Bower’s explanation of why she posts photos of her children on social media was not well received. Picture: Instagram

Ergo, I’m putting my child on social media to teach them a lesson about social media.

Forgetting of course that any child of six is too young to negotiate his rights in having every nappy rash, lost tooth, tantrum and naked run under the sprinkler broadcast permanently.

Bower also added below: “PS: I wanted to clarify that I revealed this feeling because I know one day he will see the numbers and have to learn that his value is not in online approval.”

“Kids are smart, y’all,” she said. “Kids know there’s likes on photos and it’s very human nature to compare. So for me, my personal growth journey is teaching my kids it doesn’t matter.”

Yeah, that’s not doing it for me I’m afraid. Part of little Weston’s digital tattoo now is that mum had a whinge because his cute little mug and birthday didn’t get enough love from those peeps in Insta-land.

It feels like a rerun of that episode in Black Mirror, the satirical TV series which explores techno-paranoia.

How my mum friend and I derided the scenario where people “rate” each other on daily interactions, a score which is available for everyone to see. And judge. Of course.

The episode of satirical TV show Black Mirror that showed people “rating” each other is dangerously close to reality. Picture: supplied

Digital expert Peter Sutton, who describes himself as a social media sociologist, told me: “We see a lot of teens in schools who obsess over social media likes and parents don’t understand the technology themselves, let alone how to parent around it.

“We pause to decide if this is a moment worthy of Facebook. It’s your child’s digital footprint. These type of situations are driven by the values of the mother.

“It’s a good lesson about how powerful the community can be when you are out of touch with the value set a society carries. You get international recognition or condemnation for that.”

I have a friend who was a baby of the 1970s, when social media was still a blue sky idea along with phones that worked without cords.

Her mum — no doubt addled by months of a crying infant — wrote in her baby book of her frustrations about her baby’s inability to settle and sleep.

The sentences were there, black and white, tucked up with a lock of hair, a first tooth, and cards from family welcoming the new addition. Rightly or wrongly this new mum needed to vent, and had probably forgotten those words when she handed the book over to my friend.

Reading about the disappointment she had caused as an infant was painful and she has never forgotten them.

She is 50-year-old parent of two children now and she still feels the pain of letting down her mum.

But no one will ever have to see that book. Her anguish and humiliation remains private and that she is grateful for.

Children of the social media age — especially those of mummy bloggers — have no such choice.

@whatlouthinks