'My ex has a photo of him with our son on his dating profile and it's not OK'

"He's using Billy to increase his chances of finding dates... I was not asked, nor told."

My ex, *Luke and I broke up over three years ago now. We’d been together for seven years and share our now five-year-old son, *Billy together.

To be honest, it wasn’t the most amicable of break ups and the first year or, so it was quite bumpy.

Over the past year, though we have both tried to genuinely overcome our issues for the sake of our son and in an attempt to co-parent together positively and it had been going reasonably well.

That was until I became aware of Luke’s online dating profiles, specifically the photo he was using in all of them – a selfie of him and Billy.

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Source: Kidspot.

"I was not asked, nor told"

I can't begin to say how absolutely horrified I was to discover our son’s image being used for this purpose. I was not asked, nor told, instead, a mutual friend brought it to my attention which made the whole thing even worse. It felt purposefully deceitful.

I have always been very strict when it comes to e-safety. I work in an industry that is related to this and I am very aware of some of the usages of children’s images that have often been uploaded to social media, or other sites or applications.

I know that these images, even if put out there with the best intentions aren’t always used for the best intentions by other people. Because of this, I have always insisted on two rules – no public photos shared online of our son and that we need to ask his permission to share any image that includes him. I think consent is critical even at a young age.

So, when I discovered that Luke had used Billy’s photo on at least three public dating profiles I was already angry, then when I asked Billy about the photo and whether he knew that his dad had put it online, he told me he didn’t.

This was when our amicable co-parenting relationship began to fall apart again.

I called Luke and asked to speak with him in person. When he came around, I ensured that Billy was out with my mum so I could speak with him privately.

Despite my best efforts though I just couldn’t hold back and what I did want to be a calm and rational conversation, well it turned into a complete takedown of my ex and his complete disregard for the rules we had established together and for our child’s safety.

"Using Billy to find dates"

I said that he was effectively using Billy to increase his chances of finding dates. That the only reason he was using the picture was that it framed him as the ‘hands-on single dad’ stereotype and that this would appeal to women.

He told me that I was overreacting, that the rule was ridiculous, and he only ever agreed to it initially because he knew that there was no reasoning with me about it but now that he was not with me, he no longer wished to follow it.

He said everyone uses images of their kids online and what did it matter if it was a Facebook or Instagram profile picture or a dating profile one?

He also added that heaps of other people do it on dating apps too and that it isn’t to make him look likeable but just because Billy is a part of the package if anyone were to date him.

The argument went round and round in circles. It was clear Luke wouldn’t change his mind, he believed he has done nothing wrong and would shut down any case study I told him about where the dangers of sharing these images publicly could go very wrong.

In fact, he explicitly refused to change the image even after I asked him to do this, telling me I “needed to move on.”

The thought of any adult being able to view Billy online, in numerous dating apps of all places, well it just makes me feel sick. Who knows who is looking at him?

The fact is though, there isn’t really much I can do about it so I just hope that some decent woman matches with Luke ASAP so he can take the profiles down.

*Names have been changed for privacy reasons.

Originally published as 'My ex has a photo of him with our son on his dating profile and it's not OK'