3 ‘trends’ that parents hate plus one you might not believe!
Can you relate?
Facebook, Instagram and TikTok have changed the way we interact and share our lives with friends and loved ones – as well as with strangers – and people have been discussing online the three worst parenting trends.
We’re rounded up three of the least popular trends – two social; one IRL – plus one that will have you scratching your head.
The first trend: posting videos of young kids
Oversharing is a massive problem for lots of parents.
“Posting the child’s entire life on social media” said one poster on Reddit. “It’s one thing to include a family picture with everyone. But putting a child’s entire life online, without their consent, isn’t good”.
“Oversharing stuff about your kids on social media. A picture of little Johnny’s poop in the potty is not cute, it’s disgusting,” blasted a poster. “You wouldn’t post a picture of your own feces [sic] in the toilet, doesn’t make any difference coming from a 2 year old.”
“Public internet shaming is one of the worst things one can do to a child, because who knows whether that will follow that poor kid around for years,” posted a parent, who went on to add “When the cyber-bullying is coming from inside their own house, nowhere is safe. (And that’s not even getting to the people who “prank” their kids and make them miserable for the views.)”
Embarrassing kids was high up the anger-ometer on this thread as it invades their privacy.
“Recording your children when you punish them. That’s private- not for the public. Anything posted on the internet lasts forever. And children are cruel, wait until at school see. They will carry that their entire lives.”
Many people commented on how they were lucky to grow up in a time when things couldn’t be over-shared on social media!
“My parents would always publicly gloat and brag to other family and friends about punishments or other humiliating moments,” before continuing “I still remember … and it still makes me angry looking back! That’s not even a tenth of how humiliating it must be when social media is involved!”
And meltdown, tantrums and other out-of-control videos are also a big no-no.
“Posting videos of your autistic kid having a meltdown or just as a prop for likes,” said another, which was echoed by a poster who said “I think about how I would feel if I were having a meltdown and someone shoved a camera in my face… Like???? Someone help me out here???? “
Sharing kids’ tantrums online are a big no-no, according to parents on Reddit.
The second trend: privacy in the home
Most parents don’t remove a door ‘just because’ and it usually follows extended periods of worrying behaviour and having had their child – often high schoolers – lock themselves in. Whatever the individual reason, these posters had strong opinions about such parenting ‘tools’.
“Removing doors when your kid asks for privacy” said one. “You just kind of prove why they want a door”!
This practice seems to have had long-lasting affects on adults.
“The top half of my bedroom door was cut off, and I had no privacy for any of the time I was living at home as soon as I was a teenager”.
“My mom and stepdad (and also a different ex-stepdad) did this a couple times when I was being a mouthy teenager,” and said they didn’t realise how messed up it was at the time.
“My sister did this to my nephews,” said one mum. “She could have been so much better to them if she wasn’t so worried about her (also multiple ex)husbands and keeping men happy.”
Is knocking over-rated? No door, no worries!
The third trend: over-scheduling activities
There are so many awesome activities that kids can take part in and there is something from everyone – from every type of sport and dance you can name, to art, science and more. But how much is too much?
According to members of Reddit, packing everything in is a big problem for young kids.
“When I was teaching, I remember my kindergartners telling me they had no time to play because every day consisted of non-stop structured sports, dance and such,” said a teacher.
“Assuming that it’s your job to help them find their ‘thing’ so they can be happy and successful in life. I think it just makes kids over busy, stressed, unable to explore freely in down time, not know what to do with stillness,” wrote another.
One parent took it further by saying, that from personal experience “I can tell you this 100% will teach the kids work ethic…” before adding “And that work ethic is to overwork yourself until you burn out, and your family barely sees you.”
These three trends might resonate to a degree, but scroll down to see one more!
Kids can be worn out by too many activities.
Believe it or not!
It takes a while to get your head around this… maybe you agree?
“My neighbour’s daughter is a “crunchy mom” wannabe influencer. [Her] Daughter will not allow adjectives to be used when speaking with her toddler or baby,” said one stunned poster. “They are supposed to discover descriptive words through exploration of their environment. I’m sort of unclear on how they are supposed to discover words that are never spoken, like colours or size or shape…”
“I’m not sure I understand what this means exactly” asked one parent, reflecting the thoughts of others.
“You can say hand me the ball. You cannot say hand me the the red ball,” explained the poster. “You can say look at the dinosaur, you cannot say look at the big dinosaur. You can say look at the water running in the gutter. You cannot say look at the water running quickly in the gutter…”
“That is just… wow,” came the reply. “I always thought the more rich and varied language children are exposed to, the better.”
But confusion wasn’t the only reaction, others were of concern about development.
“As someone who is pursuing a career in Speech Language Pathology: that is absolutely not okay. Children learn by listening to the people around them, and eventually assimilating the words they hear to the object/idea…
“If you don’t use language around your child, they won’t develop that language. So the poor thing will end up with delayed speech patterns.”
