A hundred years ago, parents didn’t have to make a decision about whether or not to share images of their children on the internet. Society has changed so much, and as a result, we face new situations, challenges, and dilemmas. These deserve to be given some thought.
First of all, why should you listen to what I have to say about this topic? As my husband previously worked in the corporate world for a large tech company, he was privy to firsthand understanding exactly how the population’s data is used and manipulated online – and could see where all of this was headed. He felt so strongly about the convictions he developed based on his observations, that he quit his high-paying, cushy corporate job and has been solely an entrepreneur to generate our family’s income for the last nearly 3 years. Over the last 4-5 years, my husband has become somewhat of an expert in the realm of tech privacy. Being his wife, I have learned alongside him much of what is really going on technologically in our society, and am very aware of the attempts being made by large corporations, entities, and powers-that-be to enslave humanity via technological use. Yes, this sounds very extreme and dark, but once you understand the direction humanity has been guided via the use of technology, especially in recent decades and even just the last few years, you then have a choice on how to proceed in using such technologies, and this is very liberating.
I know that most parents do not think twice about sharing images or videos of their children on social media. It’s the norm in our society, and it’s also most common to not question the norm. My intention is not to cast any judgment on others’ choices. My intention is to shed some awareness on a situation that most parents may not have questioned previously, and that is not discussed honestly in the mainstream nearly enough.
The following are 10 reasons why I do not share images or videos of my child (nor will I of my future children) on social media/the internet. These reasons all feel equally weighted in importance to me, so they are not in any specific order:
1. It is my #1 job as a parent to protect my child.
The belief that informs all of my work behind Sacred Birth Symposium is that I am a Steward of Birth – a shepherd, a protector. The entire reason why I feel called to protect the process of birth is actually to protect and honor the soul that is incarnating into this life.
Our babies and children do need protection from us, their parents whom they chose. Until they are able to truly look out for and protect themselves, it is my duty to protect my children. When it comes to the question of whether or not to share images of my child on the internet, I feel that the risk is higher than the reward, and the best way I can protect my children is to simply choose to abstain from share their image publicly.
2. I don’t have my child’s consent.
My child is a person who deserves to have boundaries and the ability to consent to what is done to her or her property (images of her), just like an adult. In fact, she deserves her consent to be respected even more than an adult, because she is she is not old enough to intellectually understand the complexities of our world or the internet, or decide if she wants her image on it.
3. Respect for her privacy.
Privacy is a basic human/childhood right. Again, children deserve the same rights as adults. Babies and children are just as much a human being as an adult is. Babies are not lesser beings just because they do not have the same mental capacity as adults. They deserve even more support and protection as they are just developing and learning how to be in this new world they find themselves in. Truly, it is my belief that babies are actually more spiritually evolved and connected to Source than adults.
4. You relinquish rights to images/videos once you share them online.
Even if you keep your social media profile private, the images and video you share on those platforms are not your images anymore and anything can be done with them. Once you post content of any type on a social media or internet platform, you are essentially handing ownership of that content over to said platform and it is no longer solely your property.
I’d like to bring up another point here, which is that many parents choose to share images of their children over social media platforms and simply add an emoji in-app overlaid on top of their children’s faces or private body regions. It is important to note that the original image of your child, pre-emoji, is what the app now has stored in their database – forever – whether you ever delete the media, or your account, or not. If the true reason for you posting your child anonymously is actually to protect your child’s privacy, it is in yours and your children’s best interest to not reveal these parts of your child (face or private body regions) EVER to these social media platfroms, emoji or not. This means simply abstaining from uploading such imagery onto these platforms.
For example, any content shared on Instagram or Facebook is now property of Meta. Since you no longer own those images or videos, you have no control over what they are used for and they are now in the hands of strangers, who are arguably not trustworthy. Which brings me to my next two points…
5. Child porn is rampant.
Any images of your child, naked or not, may be used in nefarious ways.
It has recently come out that many internet-based platforms, apps, games, and the like – even marketed towards children – have been used in nefarious ways such as grooming children for child sexual abuse, exposing them to sexual situations far before they should be (which is sexual abuse), blatant pedophilia, and more. Check out Scrolling2Death Podcast and the work of Nicki Reisberg if you’d like to dig into this topic more deeply.
I think we can all universally agree that we do not want images or videos of our children used in such nefarious ways.
6. AI advancements.
Technology keeps advancing, and the general public often finds out about technological advancements long after they have been perfected. One said advancement that many people don’t think about the repercussions of (and I will not be getting into the details of here), is Artificial Intelligence.
Did you know that AI can create manufactured images of your child based on previous images shared – even age projected images? These manufactured images could be used in many ways to cause harm to your child or your family, now or in the future.
Furthermore, your child’s imagery can be used to train AI to become even more sophisticated. AI can study and learn from a pool of data (imagery & videos) currently available on the internet, how to mimic humans even more effectively.
Here at Sacred Birth Symposium, we are all about preserving humanity and human traditions, so we very firmly do not support the advancement of AI in ways that may harm humanity.
I, for one, do not want to contribute to training AI by supplying it with images of my child!
7. I am not here to exploit my child.
Exploitation may seem like a strong word here, but I do believe that using your child to gain likes or followers, or make any sort of sale at all, is a form of exploitation. I know how cute & beautiful my daughter is, and I can definitely admit that if I were to be sharing images or videos of her on the internet, it would be really difficult to not expect “likes” and followers as a result.
8. My child is not for the exploitation of others.
Similar to the previous reason, my child is most certainly not for anyone else’s exploitation, benefit, or enjoyment.
I understand many out there feel they are contributing joy, innocence, and happiness to the world and hence raising the collective vibrational frequency by sharing their childrens’ images on the internet. However, I personally do not feel it is my children’s job or purpose to bring joy to the collective via the internet. Certainly, if you are someone my child encounters or knows in their real, in-person life, and you equally contribute something positive to my child’s life, then yes, I find peace in knowing that my child has contributed some joy to your life. On the contrary, if anything, it is my choice whether or not I personally would like to contribute to raising the collective vibrational frequency by sharing my own unique gifts with the world via the internet – and I do choose to do so in various ways through our Sacred Birth Symposium platform. This is my contribution to the world, and my daughter and future children may choose to make similar choices, when they are old enough – and that is okay, and first and foremost, up to them.
My child is a child. Her purpose during her childhood is to enjoy her life – not make yours more enjoyable.
9. Monetisation of her data.
Once images are released to a social media platform, they can be sold and profited off of. This is not something I consent to, nor does my child.
It is very important that you always familiarize yourself with the ever-updating terms & agreements of the “free” (or paid!) social media/apps you consent to using on a daily basis.
10. Energetic cords of attachment & psycho spiritual abuse.
There are dark entities in our universe and sharing my daughter’s image online makes her susceptible to them attaching to her energetically. Since energy travels over time and space and is not physically tangible, it is often referred to as “energetic cords of attachment,” when either a person or entity fixates or otherwise energetically attaches to someone, even just by discovering their likeness on the internet, having never met in person.
Many people experience psycho spiritual abuse via energetic cords of attachment from unknown malevolent entities, and have no idea this is what they are experiencing or that it could be the cause of their suffering – anything from low energy to night terrors – and may struggle to pinpoint that this is the cause of their struggle, without deeply tapping in to their own intuition or working with a trusted psychic medium, energy healer, or the like.
You may have heard of energy vampires – this is a similar concept in which a person or entity may drain you energetically (or emotionally) by having attached to you, much like a parasite.
Final Thoughts
This is a heavy topic, and we would all like to believe the world is a beautiful, loving place that doesn’t harbor such evil. But as parents, we must face the reality of the nature of the internet. We must understand that truly nothing is free in life. The use of social media platforms is not exempt from this reality. When you use social media apps, something is being collected in return: your data, your energy, your time.
I’d also like to address how many parents are possibly sharing “anonymous” imagery of their children on social media platforms simply because they feel (whether consciously or unconsciously) that it is a trend, and they feel compelled to “jump on the bandwagon,” so to speak. Another way I have seen people refer to this phenomenon is that some parents are only doing this to “virtue signal.” I do not completely agree that “virtue signalling” is the correct terminology to accurate describe what these parents are doing. However, I do feel that is extremely inauthentic when a parent decides to “anonymize” their children’s imagery on the internet simply because they notice other parents doing so and without fully comprehending why – and that if you apply your discernment, you will be able to tell who genuinely cares about respecting their children’s privacy and who doesn’t. I feel it is very unfortunate that some parents are being inauthentic about this, because it then dilutes the actions and message delivered by parents like myself, who most wholly understand the gravity of the situation and are acting truly & genuinely from a deep place of love and protection for their children.
Ultimately, it is up to each parent to decide what they are comfortable with and how to proceed when it comes to the issue of sharing imagery of their children on the internet. It is my hope that this short blog article can help you understand the true reasons why some parents, like myself and my husband, choose to abstain from sharing imagery of their children on the internet – and that if your maternal or paternal intuition guides you to the same choice, that is more than okay! Even if this means you have changed your mind from once sharing imagery of your children to abstaining, now that you fully understand the situation you are being presented with.
