Latest / Stuff Mom Never Told You / The Dark Side of Mom Influencers

Transcript

The Dark Side of Mom Influencers · Stuff Mom Never Told You

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Samantha and welcome to Stephane.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: Never told your protection of iHeart Radio, and today we
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: are once again thrilled, so ecstatic, joyful to be joined
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: by the amazing world traveling bridget I love the introductions
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: you all give. They won't they like truly warm my heart? Yes,
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: well you warm our heart by being here, especially when
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: you're doing so much other stuff and you are coming
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: at us from a different location. Correct, that's right, I'm
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: coming from you live. Well, not it won't be live
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: when people hear this, but live for right now from
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: Mexico City, Mexico, where it's nice and warm. Yeah, it's
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: lovely here. It looks lovely. You've got like a like
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: healthy light glow coming in behind me. Where we're staying
• 1:08
  Speaker 1: is like has a lovely view and like all the
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: different monuments and stuff. And then there's I didn't know
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: that Mexico City is so mountainous, so it's like a
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: really it's kind of like being in California, like a
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: beautiful view. But then skyscrapers. Yeah, ten out of ten
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: can recommend. Yes, So you're having a good time. Can
• 1:28
  Speaker 1: you give us some highlights, some food? Maybe that you've had.
• 1:31
  Speaker 1: Oh yes, everything I've eaten has been amazing. Honestly, it's
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: so One of the reasons I wanted to come to
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: Mexico City was because of the food. I've been told
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: that you could go to like Michelin Star, super Bougee
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: restaurants and get a delicious meal in Mexico City if
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: you wanted to, or just get like, you know, cheap
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: tacos on the street and that would be delicious. And
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: so I've been eating all the things, lots of street tacos,
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: which are great. Something else I like is they take
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: breakfast very seriously here. I am a breakfast person. I
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: really like that. So lots of good breakfasts items. Yeah,
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: so far I've I've I've only been here since Saturday,
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: so it hasn't been that long. But looking forward to
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: eating all the things. Yes, oh yes, say you've been
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: there almost a week, so yeah, I think you've gotten
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: You've gotten some variety. I'm sure you're gonna have a
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: whole lot more. But that's I'm very jealous of, like
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: the breakfast because I'm sure it's all spicy and delicious.
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: There's something about a savory, spicy breakfast. It does it
• 2:29
  Speaker 1: really doesn't want it. I'll be there. Save a couch
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: for me, Save a couch. Yes, yes, as well. We're
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: looking forward to checking back in more food updates hopefully.
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: But yeah, thank you so much for taking the time
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: to join us from a different city when you haven't
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: been there. That loan oh always a pleasure. And my
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: own podcast, There Are No Girls on the Internet is
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: on a hiatus, so I feel like in this time
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: where I'm not podcasting, having an outlet where I and
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: be like I saw this thing on the internet and
• 3:07
  Speaker 1: I have to talk about it with somebody has been
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: great for me. So thank you for having me. Yes, absolutely,
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: And the topic he bought today is fascinating and such
• 3:21
  Speaker 1: like a big one and one that we have discussed
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: a lot on the show recently because we've been kind
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: of on a tech streak on the show and not
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: to like, not to put words into anyone else's mouths.
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: But I didn't grow up with social media. I got
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: it late college. I would say it was the earliest
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: that I got. Some friends of mine got it when
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: I was in high school, but I was kind of
• 3:49
  Speaker 1: a late bloomer, as they say, And I know it
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: sounds kind of like back in my day, but I'm
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: pretty thankful for it, honestly in a lot of ways.
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: And this this kind of new phenomenon of all of
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: our lives, but especially in this outline bridget of children's
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: lives being on the internet is fairly new and in
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: a lot of ways kind of disturbing, a little unsettling.
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: I did want to ask before we get into this
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: conversation both of you, what was your kind of experience
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: with social media? And also, and you can pass on
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: this one because I know it's kind of a fraught subject.
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: Does your family follow you on social media? Oh? What
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: a good question. Well, you know, we just before we
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: got on here talked about the fact that I am
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: from the generation of beepers and that the Internet was
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: not a thing until I almost got into college. Essentially,
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: like at the tail end of everything. The beeper was
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: due to my job and at my first job out
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: of college, I was a child abuse investigator and those
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: systems were getting online, were you. I was still in
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: the time when we were doing everything by hand. Essentially,
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: that was where I am. The technology and social media
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: was fairly new for me. I think outside of college
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: I had like MySpace, and Facebook. I dabbled at first,
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: and since then I'm like, Okay, I like the social
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: media thing. But I am also very grateful, especially seeing
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: what my nieces and nephew have gone through with social media,
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: which they are gen zer so it's a whole different level.
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: I do have family that follow me. I do not
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: like it, and now a post less because they follow me. Yeah. Say,
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: we were talking about how the first time I met you, Samantha,
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: you this was just a couple of years ago, you
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: had a beeper on your person the first time we
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: met in person years ago. Yeah, my relationship with social media,
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: I Anny, I'm kind of like you, Like, I am
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: so glad that I came of age in a time
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: where social media, Like I'm glad that what I was
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: doing on social media or like the early days of
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: my Internet usage is not still around behunt me or
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: at LEAs Scott, I hope not. So. I was using
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: things like live journal when I was in early high school.
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: And I remember I was in college when we first
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: got Facebook, and before Facebook, it was my Space, so
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: like I was like a scene kid and so college,
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: like my Space dominated my college experience. Like that was
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: like how you understood and kept up with my gross
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: scenster hipster friends in college. But it's funny because even
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: though I was dabbling with social media back then, it's
• 6:57
  Speaker 1: so different than it is today, Like it like it
• 6:59
  Speaker 1: doesn't even feel the same thing. I guess it technically
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: was social media, but the implications were so different than
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: I mean, back then, you were spending hours making it
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: so that when you go to your MySpace page it
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: has like falling stars and an AutoPlay panic at the
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: disco song that nobody can pause. But it was stuff
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: like that, and it was social media, but it was
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: so different than today. The question of whether or not
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: my family follows me on social media, I don't allow
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: them to follow me on social media. This could be
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: along our conversation, but I feel like I've kind of
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: accepted that my social media and digital presence is not
• 7:38
  Speaker 1: actually who I am in real life, and so you know,
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: you should really be thinking about, like when you post
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: on social media, like who is your audience? Who is
• 7:46
  Speaker 1: this for? And so who I actually am that the
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: audience for that is like my friends and family, people
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: who knew me in real life, my online persona, if
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: you will, that's not for my friends and family. That's
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: where people who are interest that in my podcast, interested
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: in my content, that kind of thing like, And so
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: I draw like pretty clear distinction between the two. Like
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: I almost think of my social media or my like
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: digital self as like my avatar for my real self.
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: And I don't like the idea of the two kind
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: of the two world's kind of overlapping. So I try
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: to keep a very clear distinction between my friends and
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: family IRL and my social media persona, which I don't
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: see as my real self, If that makes sense. I
• 8:28
  Speaker 1: know I probably sound like somebody who just took a
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: huge bong rip. I swear to god, I have not.
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: You know, that's pretty fascinating because I think that says
• 8:38
  Speaker 1: a lot to the reality of social media when you
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: say it like that, there is a persona and there's
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: this whole level of understanding that there's a difference between
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: the person and what's seen on screen in different accounts
• 8:53
  Speaker 1: and different platforms. And I know, as we're talking about
• 8:57
  Speaker 1: the subject you're bringing, which I have a lot of opinions,
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: so I'm really really excited and a lot of concerns,
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: just as being in child welfare, but in that level
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: of what we see and what is posted, and who
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: has control of what is being posted. Absolutely, it's so complicated.
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: And I think it's complicated for me as a grown
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: woman in my thirties. I can only managine how much
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: more complicated it gets navigating this as a young person.
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: So I know that I came on the show quite
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: a while ago to talk about Francis Hogan, the Facebook
• 9:28
  Speaker 1: whistle blower, and what she her whistle blowing revealed about
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: what Facebook and Instagram knows about how social media negatively
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: it impacts young girls. And so that was a conversation
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: that we had. But this conversation is a little bit
• 9:40
  Speaker 1: different because it really asks what happens when it's not
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: the you know, teen or the child getting on social
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: media themselves. What happens when it's the mom or the
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: parent who is kind of forcing I use that word
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: in quotes, forcing their child to be part of their
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: social media content, part of their social media persona. And
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: so on my podcast, there are no girls on the Internet.
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: I did this fascinating interview with this woman, Sarah Adams,
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: and she runs the TikTok account mom Uncharted. She told
• 10:10
  Speaker 1: me that she calls her account mom uncharted because social media,
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: if you think about it, it's really like this uncharted
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: territory for parenting, and we really do not know how
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: social media will impact our kids. If you want to
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: listen to the whole interview, check out my podcast It's
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: It's she's a really fascinating person, but her social media
• 10:28
  Speaker 1: account is dedicated to explorations of kind of mom influencing
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: and like mom run accounts and all the different ways
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: that parents. It's honestly, it's usually moms use their children
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: for content on social media. She told me that social media,
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: you know, the dynamics around it have changed so quickly,
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: not that long ago. If I was to say something like, oh,
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: sharing your kid on social media, you might think that
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: means like posting a cute picture on Facebook where your
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: great aunt or your uncle or something might like it. Now,
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: kids we're not even really old enough to understand what
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: it means, not to mention, not old enough to consent
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: to it, can have their most intimate or sensitive or
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: embarrassing moments seen by millions of people on social media
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: platforms like TikTok. Right, as we've said in a lot
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: of these past episodes, this is sort of an iteration
• 11:31
  Speaker 1: of things we've seen before. This is going to also
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: kind of age me. But my parents wants in a
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: video of me as a kid to America's funny as
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: some videos, But that's like very different, Like they weren't
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: going to make money off of it, right, But what
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: were you doing in the video? Never you mind? I
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: was alternately like so enamored with a frog and then
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: terrified of the frog. It's just like it wasn't that funny,
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: but I thought it was very funny. But then it
• 12:01
  Speaker 1: became like you know, reality TV, and we've talked about
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: those things before as well, of like kind of the
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: dance Mom's situation. And then now it becomes what we're
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: seeing on social media where people are making money off
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: of this content of their kids, where the kids can't
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: consent to it, where it will probably never be able
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: to be fully erased if that's what they wanted. If
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: that's what they wanted, And then I know we're going
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: to talk about this later, but there's kind of all
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: these achy issues around, like paras social relationships people develop
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: with these kids, and what do we do about that?
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: Like is that the platform? Is it the parent that's
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: posting this content? Like all of these questions that come
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: from from what it like one level can seem like, oh,
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: this is just a cute video of this kid falling
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: over something, but on, but when you dig deeper than that,
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: there's just all of these other questions exactly and you
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: put it so well right, Like, just to level set,
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: I don't feel like every parent who shares content of
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: their kid is is created equal here, Like, there's a
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: pretty big difference between you know, sharing the occasional family
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: vacation video or like cute picture or whatever with your
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: friends on social media or even the wider Internet. There's
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: a difference between that which I think most people do
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: and is like fine and running a business that generates
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: income from relying on an audience of millions of people
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: engaging with your child, right, And there are so many
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: questions that you just kind of alluded to and reasons
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: for why we should sort of be asking questions about
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: what that is doing to our kids. One of the
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: things that I think is unique about social media and
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: technology in general is how quickly it moves. Things just
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: move really quickly, and I think that when it comes
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: to our kids and the impact on our kids, it
• 13:55
  Speaker 1: would behove us to not move really quickly, would behove
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: us to take a minute, pump the brakes and do
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: some real deep thought about how we want our children
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: to be showing up on social media and whether or
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: not it's actually good for them psychologically, emotionally, and whether
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: or not it's actually safe like in the real you know,
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: in every implication of the word, like sometimes it is
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: not safe to share so much of your child on
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: social media with strangers. You know, first there might be
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: a negative psychological impact on kids. I really wanted to
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: find I was like, oh, I'm going to get some
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: good media research on this. But as the uncharted part
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: of Sarah Adams's TikTok Names suggests, there kind of isn't
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: a ton of good research out there about the way
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: that being used for content by your parents would impact children.
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: And that's partly because it's just so new. Morgan sung
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: over at NBC. She's one of my favorite Internet reporters,
• 14:50
  Speaker 1: and she's really been following this beat of young people
• 14:54
  Speaker 1: who have been kind of turned into content by their parents.
• 14:57
  Speaker 1: So Morgan spoke to Lindsey Cooley, who was a light
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: since clinical child psychologists, who said that because social media
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: is so relatively new. There is not really a lot
• 15:05
  Speaker 1: of clinical research on the long term effects of what
• 15:08
  Speaker 1: she calls growing up online, but lately, some kids who
• 15:12
  Speaker 1: did grow up with parents who shared every aspect of
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: their lives on social media are starting to speak out.
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: Morgan Thong talked to Cam, whose mom used to make
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: content about their life. Kim said that their mom sharing
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: every single detail of their life had a real negative
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: impact on their mental health, and eventually they kind of
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: stopped being open with their mom about whatever they were
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: going through because they knew this is just going to
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: wind up being shared on the internet with her followers.
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: Cam is immunocompromised and would spend a lot of time
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: ill or sick, and rather than like being there for them,
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: Cam says that their mom would just be filming these
• 15:48
  Speaker 1: filmingns for content. So at times in their life where
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: they were sick or stressed or going through something difficult,
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: their mom would be there with a camera in their face, right,
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: And I think that's the way you phrased it, of like,
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: you know, using kids for content, of like then you
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: become something like a tool to get clicks, as opposed
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: to like a child that needs care and needs help
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: and needs respects, and how damaging that absolutely would be
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: if if you start to feel like, oh, it's just
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: like my tears are just a way for you to
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: film something and get people to watch it. Like what
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: what would that do to you? Like that's very damaging?
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: I think yeah. And it's actually as an adult, like
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: speaking of that sort of distinction between my social media
• 16:40
  Speaker 1: life or my digital life and my real life. I
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: don't really share a lot of my like real life
• 16:47
  Speaker 1: on social media, and in part it's because of that
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: tension that you just named. If I have something in
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: my life it is really truly meaningful to me, I
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: am really uncomfortable with the idea of that being content,
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: of that being something to generate clicks, of that being
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: something that's going to have a number attached to it, like, oh,
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: three hundred people liked that my grandfather passed away or whatever.
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: Like I'm I really am not comfortable with that personally,
• 17:17
  Speaker 1: and so I tend to keep big or meaningful real
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: life moments off of social media because of that, because
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: I don't like the idea, and I'm like, no shade
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: to anybody who doesn't feel that way, this is just
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: how it feels. For me, it just doesn't feel right,
• 17:33
  Speaker 1: and I think for me it feels like it is
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: does a disservice to how meaningful those moments truly are
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: in my life. I don't want to see Mark Zuckerberg's
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: engagement metric on the back end of something that was
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: like deeply meaningful to me in my real life. That
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: seems the cheap and that feels a little bit cheap
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: to me, I guess, yeah, And it is interesting because again,
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: we are adults, and if you want to post that
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: content and you're contenting to yeah, you're so you can
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: consent to it. Then that's one thing. It still feels
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: strange because that's a whole separate podcast, but kind of
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: still like, oh, here's this sad thing. I have to
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: like it because otherwise they're gonna be mad. I didn't
• 18:12
  Speaker 1: like it, Like there's like this kind of social dynamic
• 18:15
  Speaker 1: around it that feels odd because then you're like, well,
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: I'm liking this thing. That's really sad, but if I
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: don't do it. But I do think that, and please
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: don't come at me, listeners, but I do think like,
• 18:27
  Speaker 1: in the same way people sometimes use like pets or
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: puppies to be like Oh look, how cute. Click on
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: this content. Here they are people are using their kids
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: like that, like see here's my life. Here's this like
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: view of my life, and like, oh, what did my
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: kid do today to get these clicks? And if that
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: is like, oh, my kid is very sick and I
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: am going through a hard time. Please, you know, give
• 18:54
  Speaker 1: me these likes, give me this engagement. It does become
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: pretty murky, right. You know. It's interesting too as we
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: were talking about the levels, like you're talking about social
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: media etiquette, which has been a conversation like how do
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: you go from this, but also how social media has grown,
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: Like when you think of the initial Facebook, it was
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: literally to connect with college friends for me, or your
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: past friends or high school friends that you haven't seen.
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: So you may be updating so I might get a
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: picture of my old high school friend who had a
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: child and oh how cute. And it wasn't necessarily about
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: getting likes and looks. It's just hey, I'm updating you
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: about my life, even to the point that like wedding announcements,
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: funeral announcements were done on Facebook. I'm on Facebook still
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: to remember people's birthdays and to get an event advice
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: because a lot of people used to use that as
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: the way of getting invitations or birthday parties or even
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: sometimes weddings, which is really odd. But the level that
• 19:49
  Speaker 1: we have grown to is this genre of TikTok. TikTok
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: is not a thing you can do private, and you
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: can do small content, but it really is a race
• 19:59
  Speaker 1: to see what can go viral and what can make
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: money and what can get sponsorships. And it's changed vastly
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: from what an elder millennial light myself knew it as
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: to what it is today. But because people are learning
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: things so fast or getting access to things so quickly,
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: the etiquette has been kind of lost or lost in
• 20:21
  Speaker 1: translation perhaps, and it's become a point that for the
• 20:25
  Speaker 1: Gen Z years and I guess newer millennials, what are
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: those younger millennials baby millennials have seen this as a
• 20:32
  Speaker 1: norm and don't didn't realize until maybe just recently, as
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: the younger generators who've been on social media all of
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: their lives since their birth have started to call it
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: out that this was normal and in competition and a
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: way of possibly making a living, and it's just kind
• 20:47
  Speaker 1: of made this whole culture completely different from what it
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: was even three years ago. Oh my god, that's that's
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: such an insightful point. And I do think it is
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: like it is not just human nature. It is a
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: little bit, it's some of it, but it's also exactly
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: what you said, I think. I think it's algorithmically generated
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: platforms where whatever is extreme or over the top or
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: whatever gets more attention, and platforms like TikTok, where that
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: is the currency is like that, that's what gets engagement.
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: Is is that attention And so you have people, so
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: that's that's like its own thing. When you add in
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: kids to the mix, that it just kind of has
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: the potential to really be so fraught. Like I remember,
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: it was some YouTuber I don't know her name off hand,
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: but she was kind of like quote unquote canceled because
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: she was known for being like a YouTuber who showed
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: her family and her family pet passed away, and so
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: she was making a YouTube video about how her family
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: pet passed away, and I guess she accidentally uploaded the
• 21:56
  Speaker 1: unedited footage where her child was very like genuinely authentically
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: upset and crying and the parent was, rather than consoling
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: this child, trying to tell the child to contort his
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: face so that it would be really so it would
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: be like a really extreme picture of them crying, because
• 22:19
  Speaker 1: she knew that if you use that image of an
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: extreme close up of like a distorted face who's experiencing
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: extreme emotion, if you use that for the thumbnail on YouTube,
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: it gets more engagement. If you ever look at YouTube
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: videos and you're wondering, why do all the thumbnails have
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: people making really weird over the top faces that nobody
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: really makes in real life, it's because they have figured
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: out that the algorithm rewards videos that include faces like that.
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: And so while this child is experiencing a genuine response
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: emotionally to losing their pet, mom is like, oh, make
• 22:51
  Speaker 1: sure that you really give me a good cry face
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: so that my YouTube video about this performs well. And
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: so I think it's not just our or as humans,
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: it's also platforms that are prompting people into behavior that
• 23:06
  Speaker 1: they would not otherwise probably do if not for the
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: way that platforms kind of encourage us to do this.
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: Do that makes sense? No, yeah, absolutely, I think again,
• 23:15
  Speaker 1: like the Squeaky Will gets the Oil type of thing
• 23:18
  Speaker 1: where you see the most dramatic or the most over
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: the top, like one of the things that's really thriving
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: on TikTok is people calling out other people for cheating
• 23:27
  Speaker 1: or thinking they're cheating if you're so and so I
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: just saw her husband here talking into this girl like
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: that's been a big thing and it shouldn't be as before.
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: Like there's a part of this, like, yes, let the
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: women know so they can get out, but it's also
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: purely for entertainment, for the numbers, for the likes, And
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: then as we see with these children, more and more
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: shocking things that people think is okay, I know a
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: YouTuber as you were talking about another YouTuber family, we
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: talked about this recently. Actually, in one of the episodes
• 23:55
  Speaker 1: you came on, the couple adopted the child just for
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: the sake of saying, where good people and adopted this child,
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: come on this journey with us, and then all of
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: a sudden, the child disappeared, and everybody, look, what the
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: hell just happened? What did you do to this child?
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: And it's the same way as we've seen several the
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: couple who did the experiment with their two young boys saying, hey,
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: we're gonna say that one of your brothers died. Your
• 24:20
  Speaker 1: pretend brother died, just go along with it so we
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: can make money. And this was a whole experiment on
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: the kids for entertainment. The audience is supposed to know
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: that this is a joke. We're just testing the kids.
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: Let's see how the kids react. And it was so
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: traumatizing to watch these kids pretending like they're lying but
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: questioning why we're doing this, and then having it filmed
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: and everybody saying, what are you doing? This is so
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: mentally damaging to your child. But you're doing this for
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: the sake of TikTok to show what So the example
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: that you brought up earlier, the family, the YouTube family
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: that adopted a child, they're gonna We're gonna return to them.
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: They make a little surprised guest appearance in this episode.
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: I think you're right. I think that there is I
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: honestly think it goes back to something that you said, Sam.
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: I think it's a situation where because the Internet has
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: moved so quickly from where it was when I was
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: updating my MySpace profile in my dorm room in college
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: to today, that wasn't that long I'm old, but I'm
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: not that old, right, That wasn't that long ago? And
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: where we were then and where we are now are
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: completely different. So it's moved so quickly, and I think
• 25:32
  Speaker 1: it's a situation where not like the cultural norms around
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: what is and it's not acceptable, healthy, okay to do
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: a good idea to do whatever, those have not kept
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: up with how quickly the technology has moved, and so
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: we now can film our kids inside of our house
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: and quickly uploaded to TikTok or YouTube and get a
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: million views. Our society has perhaps not progressed to a
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: place where it's like but would and I would argue
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: that our laws have also not kept up with that.
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: And so I do think there's something about the speed
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: with which the internet has changed, it become so ubiquitous
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: in our lives that we have not pumped the brakes
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: and allowed for cultural norms, societal norms, the law to
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: all catch up to where we are right now, and
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: especially the fact that kids are involved. We absolutely should
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: be taking the time to be a little bit more
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: introspective and slow down a little bit, to have a
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: cultural reset about what is it is not okay when
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: it comes to filming children for strangers online, right, And
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: it kind of always reminds me of the thing that
• 26:38
  Speaker 1: I had to tell kids as Snapchat and all those
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: different things were existing, again reminding them you may think
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: it's not on the internet, but it's on the internet,
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: so just as a reminder, but also the government is
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: very quick to use things like this to go after
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: the margin laws communities, and that's a whole different conversation,
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: I know, but having to try to explain to both
• 27:00
  Speaker 1: parents and two children, like, hey, you posting this picture
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: of your half naked child is actually can be considered
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: child porn and you can be arrested on a felony,
• 27:10
  Speaker 1: and then being completely shocked, and then having also letting
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: the kids know, hey, you just sending it yourself, even
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: though you're doing it with your quote unquote consent. As
• 27:17
  Speaker 1: a minor, you don't have the ability to consent. But
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: it's only going after specific things and specific morality rather
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: than what the root of the problem is with the
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: social media. Oh my god, same I This is kind
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: of a non sequitur I had, but the most like
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: weird conversation with a stranger on TikTok it was for
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: whatever reason, I get surfaced a lot of content about hallucinogens.
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: Like hallucinogens drugs. TikTok thinks I'm very interested in like
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: expanding my mind. And there was a woman who is
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: a woman look like a woman of color to me
• 27:49
  Speaker 1: talking about how she enjoys using mushrooms and it's like, oh, like,
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: come follow me from my beautiful day on mushrooms. And
• 27:54
  Speaker 1: it did look like a beautiful day. Like she's at
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: the beach, she's like going for a swim. Looks fantastic.
• 27:59
  Speaker 1: That she goes to her car and it's like she's like, oh,
• 28:04
  Speaker 1: I had to drive home. And I was like, honey,
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: this is a video. You're a woman of color, and
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: this is a video of you admitting to a crime.
• 28:12
  Speaker 1: Like this is not me judging you or me saying this,
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: but it is me knowing that. Like I've seen people.
• 28:20
  Speaker 1: I've seen people who are going through like contentious marital
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: situations to get CPS called on them. Like I've heard
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: horror stories of people who just uploaded stuff to the
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: Internet without thinking about it, and then they lost a job,
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: they lost a scholarship, the courts got involved, and somebody
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: else was like why why is that the first thing
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: that you jump to, And I was like, I understand that,
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: Like it sucks, and I like, I don't want to
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: be the person to have to tell you this and
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: like rain out of your parade from your nice day
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: that you were trying to show what the internet. But
• 28:50
  Speaker 1: I want to be the person that tells you the truth.
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: And the truth is that especially for people of color, you,
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: I mean, nobody should have be admitting to a crime
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: on video. But that's just like and that there, do
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: what you're gonna do if you're not hurting anybody whatever,
• 29:03
  Speaker 1: but like be smart about it, Like, don't have this
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: new era of social media where we don't necessarily have
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: the cultural norms firmly established anymore, the guardrails, if you
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: know what I mean. Don't let that false feeling of
• 29:20
  Speaker 1: freedom make you think that we actually do have freedom online,
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: especially if you're marginalized. I would that is just like
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: a rule of thumb. Don't admit to crimes on the Internet.
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: That's just like, I don't care how much engagement it
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: gets you. That's just an overall But as you're saying
• 29:35
  Speaker 1: for the person who's like, why do you have to
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: go to that like pessimistic view, And I know I'm
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: always joking about the fact that I'm pessimistic, but the
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: reality is it's really privileged for someone to not have
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: to even worry about it. That's the problem. The problem
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: about this is I have been on this side of
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: where I see police officers, I see court systems actually
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: go after specific individuals because they've profiled them from jump
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: and then find the social media accounts and use every
• 30:00
  Speaker 1: bit they can from that because they're profiling once again.
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: And that I know we use that as just generalized
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: terms in the bigger picture, but it happens on social
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: media as well, as well as the fact that there
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: was a perfect example of this dude who's really big,
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: TikToker got really big because he got he was funny.
• 30:16
  Speaker 1: Everybody loved him. He thought he was just hilarious. He
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: just cuts into a video and then tells a random
• 30:23
  Speaker 1: fact that was his whole thing, and then people found
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: and dug into his earlier post where he brings his child,
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: where the child says all this homophobic and racist comments,
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: which obviously was taught by him, and he's encouraging it,
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: and everybody's getting pissed at both the child and him,
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: and this is what he's done, not realizing that he
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: was going to blow up. But that's the consequence. It's like,
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: not only have you ruined your own reputation, you've already
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: ruined your child's. Oh my god. And it's like I
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: could only see that as like a parenting fail. If
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: your kid heard you using and repeated that and you
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: knew that was behavior that they were exhibiting, that is
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: one thing. Then being like I should film this for
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: the internet because it's funny. That is I guess that's
• 31:15
  Speaker 1: what I'm saying. I'm not being very eloquent about it,
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: but I do think that we are in this point
• 31:19
  Speaker 1: where I don't know that people universally understand that not
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: every moment is okay to be shared on the internet.
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: And you know, I would I would hope for that
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: parent in that situation to be like, we need to
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: have a conversation about what is and it's not okay
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: to say the fact that this parent was like, Oh,
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: get the camera, this is gonna be great put this
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: on the internet. That really tells me that I think
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: that we are in a place where perhaps people are
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: not asking the question of should I be filming this?
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: What are the consequences? This is gonna be good for
• 31:47
  Speaker 1: my kid? Like I think that we just need to
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: have a little bit more introspection about what we share
• 31:52
  Speaker 1: to the internet for strangers and absolutely, and again, it
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: is this layer of safety that people think, because they
• 31:59
  Speaker 1: don't people's reaction, they just record it and move on
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: with their day until the consequences happened, that they're safe
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: to do this. And maybe they're thinking they're being relatable
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: or maybe they're trauma bonding with people, which is in itself,
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: like why are you doing this, and it's doing at
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: the expense of a child, thinking maybe I don't know
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: if it's legitimate or if it's a ruse saying that
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: I'm just trying to teach you. I'm just trying to
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: share our you know, our downfalls and I'm trying to
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: be real. But it's again at the expense of a
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: child's emotions and trauma. So that exact thing is the
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: reason why I wanted to talk about this because I
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: had a moment where I saw this video on TikTok
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: and I have to say it like, I was personally
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: triggered by this this TikTok that I saw, and it
• 32:43
  Speaker 1: was this video of a black mom who was washing
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: her black child's like braids, right, and so this so
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: she had a camera setup where it was holding her
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: child over the sync to like scrub her scale. And
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: this little girl was like maybe she's like seven or eight.
• 33:00
  Speaker 1: She is bawling her eyes out. She is so upset. Right.
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: And so I'm a black woman. I have braids now.
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: I have braids for most of my life when I
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: was a kid, Like a lot of black women, my
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: hair has been something that is like a complicated thing,
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: like a lot of black women have complicated feelings about
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: their hair. And I have many a memory of crying
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: while getting my hair done, crying while getting my braids
• 33:24
  Speaker 1: taken you know, taken out or put in, And I
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: remember quite viscerally what a vulnerable position that I was
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: in in those times. I'm not saying that like moms
• 33:34
  Speaker 1: shouldn't do their kids hair if they cry, but I'm
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: saying I remember that being an emotional experience for me
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: that I was very vulnerable in. And I think a
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: lot of black women know what I'm talking about. And
• 33:43
  Speaker 1: so this child is sobbing while while this is happening,
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: the mom is like everybody, millions of people that are
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: going to see how you're acting right now, and the
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: little kid is like, what do you mean, and she's like,
• 33:55
  Speaker 1: I'm filming this, And a little girl starts crying even
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: more and she's like, why are you filming this? And
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: her mom is like, I'm filming it for a hair tutorial.
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: And even though this is a little kid, she's pretty
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: she's pretty sharp. She says, why don't you film a
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: hair tutorial on your own head? And it just broke
• 34:10
  Speaker 1: my likeing something about watching that video of like I
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: remember what it was like to be in distress. Now,
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: I'm not saying that was like a traumatic experience for her.
• 34:19
  Speaker 1: Kids cry for all kinds of reasons all the time, right,
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: we were all kids once, we remember, but she's clearly
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: in distress, even if it's temporary distress. And so her
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: mom talking to the camera in this moment and being
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: like millions people are going to see this in the
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: moment really just made me sad. And the mom was
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: saying like, oh, well, Like in the comments of this TikTok,
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: she was saying like, well, I want to show other
• 34:43
  Speaker 1: black moms out there how you deal with a stressful,
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: hair washed day or and other people who were supporting
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: her were saying like, maybe she's looking for a community
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: of moms and wants to build community in solidary young line.
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: I could sort of see that, but ultimately, the number
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: one responsibility of a parent should be to create a
• 35:01
  Speaker 1: safe environment for your kid and all of this other
• 35:05
  Speaker 1: stuff like I can understand maybe sort of kind of
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: wanting to demonstrate, like, oh, here's how I, as a
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: black mom gets through a tough hair washing day. But
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: those are strangers. Your responsibility when your child is in
• 35:17
  Speaker 1: distress is to provide a safe environment for that child
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: who cares about these these strangers in your head that
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: you are thinking about entertaining or whatever via this content.
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: And that's kind of what I'm talking about, like how
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: we reached a point where folks have kind of forgotten
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: that your number one responsibility is to your child and
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: to create a safe environment for that child, even if
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: that means that this community of fictional moms looking for
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: support might have to get at someplace else, right, And
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: I know, as you said at the beginning, there hasn't
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: been a lot of research in this. I know I
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: read one article about how things like this does a
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: road like the trust a kid has and their parents,
• 36:13
  Speaker 1: because if it's like they can kind of sense, oh, well,
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: they're doing this for some other reason, or there might
• 36:18
  Speaker 1: be a trick behind this, or they might be trying
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: to manipulate an emotion out of me for someone else.
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: But also, something that I wanted to go back to
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: that you wrote about was this idea of feeling like
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: there's a invisible audience. Yeah, I found mis fascinating, so
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: Lindsay Cooley, the licensed clinical child psychologist that spoke Tom
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: Morgan Song at NBC. Coolly said that adults whose formative
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: years were shared online may never grow out of experiencing
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: what she described as the invisible audience. Basically, we've all
• 36:47
  Speaker 1: kind of probably felt that the invisible audience is this
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: kind of adolescent ideal, but everybody is paying attention to
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: you and like scrutinizing your behavior at all times. Now,
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: most of us probably felt that way at one time
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: or another in our lives, but we usually grow out
• 37:01
  Speaker 1: of it as we mature and become more self aware
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: and get a deeper sense of self. Lindsay Hooley says
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: that kids who are always being filmed for content might
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: have a harder time breaking out of that mindset because
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: they essentially grew up on a stage. They grew up
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: knowing that they had to perform and turn it on.
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: And so if that is your everyday lived experience, you
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: might have a much harder time growing out of that
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: phase when you think that everybody's looking at you, when
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: you are feeling like everybody is scrutinizing you and feeling
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: like you're being perceived with eyes on you all the time.
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: And really I can kind of understand that, Like I
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: can understand why four kids who who are constantly on
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: the stage of the internet, why that would then be
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: a hard thing to kind of break out of. Yeah,
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: and that's another issue here is the issue of privacy.
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: And as we also mentioned at the top, these parasocial
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: relationships that people can form with children who again probably
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: never consented to any of this, right, Yeah, that's something
• 38:05
  Speaker 1: that I find really interesting, I guess I'll say, is
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: this the way that adults on the internet can form
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: these parasocial relationships with kids they don't even know, you know,
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: And I the one ahead, I kind of get it, right,
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: Like they've been let in on these very intimate relationships
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: with these kids, and so I can understand forming a bond, right,
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: and how that line of what is it is not
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: appropriate and what you are and are not entitled to
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: can become blurred. There was this mom influencer on TikTok
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: recently who decided that she was going to stop showing
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: her kids on social media after sort of providing quite
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: a bit of content solely about her kids, and her
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: followers were upset, but they weren't just like they weren't
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: like cool, as your kids do what you feel as best.
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: They were not happy about that, and they felt really
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: entitled to see and interact with these kids they don't
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: even know, right, And so I remember this was around
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: Christmas time when this influencer announced that and one of
• 39:01
  Speaker 1: her followers made a video that was like can we
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: at least see the children for Christmas? Like I just
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: want to see them for Christmas? And how they could
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: not accept that they were not going to be able
• 39:13
  Speaker 1: to see and interact with kids that they didn't know.
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: And it might I don't feel like all of these
• 39:17
  Speaker 1: people have bad intentions or anything, but it is absolutely
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: not healthy for an adult stranger to feel entitled to
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: see kids that they don't even know, Like that's just
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: not healthy, you know. Of course I have to go
• 39:29
  Speaker 1: real dark with it as you're being very kind and
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: be like these are not they just really like these
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: kids and they think the relationship is adorable. But here's
• 39:38
  Speaker 1: the prime example of where we can talk about grooming
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: and what happens when these relationships over these young kids
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: become sexualized by the audience or by the followers and
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: not necessarily being done by the parents. That they may
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: be completely innocent of it, thinking that they're playing cute
• 39:57
  Speaker 1: little dress up matching mommy type of look, which is
• 40:01
  Speaker 1: often a thing, but this becomes a real dangerous road
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: of grooming and a sexualization of young children. Just I
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: know there was one specific woman who went through a
• 40:15
  Speaker 1: young girl's accounts meaning they were probably really young, maybe
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: with a parent, showing what kind of followers these accounts had,
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: and they were typically form more examples like Middle Asian
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: men commenting about how beautiful they are and how all
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: these things are, like how good they looked in this
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: outfit or all these things, and how concerning it is
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: that the parents aren't realizing that compliment is not cute.
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: It's not a cute compliment and you shouldn't sit there
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: and like them and say thanks for supporting my child,
• 40:43
  Speaker 1: which has been the response. And it is so dangerous
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: when you see that this is becoming normal exactly. So
• 40:51
  Speaker 1: I do think that there are people out there that
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: are just like, oh, I just love this baby, and
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: I have slipped into an unhealthy fixation on this baby.
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: Perhaps not badly intentioned, yes, but you are so right
• 41:02
  Speaker 1: that that that there are people for whom they do
• 41:05
  Speaker 1: have bad intentions. And it is about sexualization and greaming
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: and it's gross, like it like what I'm what I
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: want to talk about today is like just the tip
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: of the iceberg with how dangerous and gross this stuff
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: can get, because truly it's just like very dark. Um,
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: there is a trend called role playing. No, not dungeons
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: and Dragons, role playing like that. Uh, this is what
• 41:30
  Speaker 1: people Annie and I met. You were like, oh, so
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: this is a This is the trend that I actually
• 41:37
  Speaker 1: have not heard of until I researched for this episode,
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: where people on the internet will steal photos of other
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: people from social media and make new fake accounts of
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: these people with like made up stories and identities. Now,
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: sometimes this can be like mostly harmless other than the
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: fact that like it's not cool to be taking pictures
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: of kids from the internet, but like some people are doing,
• 42:00
  Speaker 1: it's just it's not it's not necessarily harmful. But in
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: other cases, some of the backstories and like fictional situations
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: involving the identity of children and the pictures that they
• 42:11
  Speaker 1: are using are sexual and so there's this influencer Katie
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: Rose Pritchard. She told Good Morning America that one day
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: that she discovered all these social media accounts made for
• 42:22
  Speaker 1: each one of her kids, but they were actually strangers
• 42:25
  Speaker 1: pretending to be her, like very young toddler children typing
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: in like baby voice in camptions on Instagram. She told
• 42:33
  Speaker 1: Good morn America that she noticed that among these role
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: playing posts on social media, they used hashtags like kid
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: RP or baby RP to indicate that's what it is,
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: and that there's like a massive community of people doing this,
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: some of whom are describing obviously sexualized fictional situations involving
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: her toddlers, and probably unsurprising, she was enraged and horrified,
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: and I think, you know, there's so many different avenues
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: to this, but one is that it's obviously a social
• 43:05
  Speaker 1: media platform accountability issue. Katie Rose Pictchard said that she
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: reached out to Instagram to have this content taken down,
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: and then at first Instagram told her that people making
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: fake account of her kids and putting them in these
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: sexual fictional situations was not against their community guidelines, but
• 43:22
  Speaker 1: eventually she kept having her followers report the content and
• 43:25
  Speaker 1: Instagram did eventually take it down. So she decided that
• 43:28
  Speaker 1: she was going to stop posting pictures of her kids
• 43:31
  Speaker 1: on social media, even though she was an influencer and
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: this had resulted in brand deals and partnerships and all
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: of that, but that it just wasn't worth it because
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: she was like, even though Instagram eventually did the right
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: thing and took these pictures of my kids down, who
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: knows where they could be. She was like, I'll never
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: know how far their pictures traveled, what dark corners of
• 43:51
  Speaker 1: the Internet her kids' images are on, and that is
• 43:55
  Speaker 1: really scary. Yeah, And you know, just to add a
• 43:58
  Speaker 1: wrench in this whole thing is with the ideas of
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: deep fakes and AI technology, which takes straight from content
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: from the Internet, there are so many disturbing things that's
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: out there. Just knowing half of that and that being
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: faked and what it's being used for. And again there's
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: no loss to truly stop this. This is kind of
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: like the freedom of speech. As long as you're not
• 44:22
  Speaker 1: violating that child and you're doing images that resemble and
• 44:26
  Speaker 1: say this is not truly then all you have to
• 44:28
  Speaker 1: do is alter something. And it can't They can escape
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: the log because there is no law for it. And
• 44:33
  Speaker 1: with the realization that once you put it on the Internet,
• 44:35
  Speaker 1: there's no ownership, true ownership, as much as you would
• 44:38
  Speaker 1: like to think there is, there's no true ownership to
• 44:40
  Speaker 1: the content that you are posting. Yeah, to your point
• 44:43
  Speaker 1: about deep fakes, mom Uncharted on her TikTok has talked
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: about again, it's so dark that I hate to even
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: go there, but like there are marketplaces for deep fakes.
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: People have been like, here's an image of a person,
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: not always an adult, sometimes it's a child. I would
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: like to see digitally manipulated, like AI generated images of
• 45:07
  Speaker 1: this child in sexual situations. That is a thing that happens.
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: And I know that it is dark, and it's like,
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: on the one hand, you feel awful when someone's like
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: posting up cute picture of their kid being I'm like, well,
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: did you know that this could out wind up on
• 45:21
  Speaker 1: a marketplace On the dark side of the Internet, but
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: I have to say the truth. It's like, it's like,
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: what is happening? And I think it's a reason why
• 45:31
  Speaker 1: more and more influencers are and people in general are
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: keeping their kids off of the Internet. Like I don't
• 45:37
  Speaker 1: have kids, but if I was a parent, I don't
• 45:39
  Speaker 1: think I would put my kids on social media. I
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: just I think that with all that I now know,
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: and I didn't always know this, I know this from
• 45:47
  Speaker 1: research from now that I know all the different, really
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: dark up, gross corners of the Internet out there, I
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: just feel like it would be a safer bet to not, Like,
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: I don't know what it would give me to introduce
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: that into my kid's life. And this, you know, this
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: is a growing thing these days. The influencer that I
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: was just talking about, she wrote on Instagram. I can
• 46:12
  Speaker 1: be angry at Instagram all day long and nothing will
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: change until we change. Instagram is not to blame for
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: the exploitation of my children. I am. They have no
• 46:20
  Speaker 1: responsibility and usually come back with we have no control
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: over what our users posts. They simply do not care.
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: And it's I think that Instagram is really abdigating responsibility here.
• 46:34
  Speaker 1: But on the other hand, Katie is not wrong about
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: this that like it really, if platforms aren't going to
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: do anything to keep young people safe online, they should
• 46:45
  Speaker 1: an absence of them being leaders and doing what they're
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: supposed to be doing to keep kids safe, we have
• 46:50
  Speaker 1: no choice but to act. And I know that that
• 46:52
  Speaker 1: is like, it should not be that way, But if
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: platforms are going to allow the kind of dark stuff
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: involving kids that they do allow, we have to be
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: the ones who are making good decisions to keep our
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: kids safe. Right Well, obviously, as you said at the
• 47:07
  Speaker 1: very beginning, as a parent, your first responsibility is the
• 47:11
  Speaker 1: safety of your child. It should be, and that's that's
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: kind of the intent to begin with. And so even
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: though yes, you may not be doing any of these
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: dark and despicable things you're like, I've I keep talking
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: about it, but like I have had nightmares of the
• 47:27
  Speaker 1: darkness that happens to children, unfortunately, because of the things
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: that I have witnessed personally, Like, that's just a thing
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: that will always be ingrained in my head. It is
• 47:37
  Speaker 1: terrifying as awful, and I hate that that's a part
• 47:40
  Speaker 1: of my psyche and that that's part of the thing
• 47:43
  Speaker 1: that I share with people, But it is really naive
• 47:47
  Speaker 1: to believe that everything is sunshine and puppy dogs, because
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: I would love that, that would be amazing. That's why
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: I can't watch dark things because I don't want to
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: live in that world. But I've seen it, and you know,
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: as you've researched more things, it gets uglier and uglier.
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: And as Instagram should be held responsible for some things,
• 48:08
  Speaker 1: it is also again the parents' responsibility at the very
• 48:11
  Speaker 1: jump for to protect a child, and unlike it sounds
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: like this one influencer did an amazing job in trying
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: to backtrack because you don't think about that. It's an
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: amazing it's a great thing to not have to think
• 48:25
  Speaker 1: about that, but then when your face with it, to
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: realize you need to do some damage control. But there's
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: those out there who as long as they get the money,
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: as dark as that seems, it doesn't seem to care,
• 48:35
  Speaker 1: and there's no law to protect the children, it seems exactly.
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: So this is something that really bombs me out, grosses
• 48:42
  Speaker 1: me out because you might be thinking, like, surely parents
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: are not knowingly making money off of their kids content
• 48:47
  Speaker 1: being served up to adult creeps. But I'm sorry to
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: report that that is what is happening with some of
• 48:53
  Speaker 1: these like mom run accounts. Sarah of Mom and Charge
• 48:57
  Speaker 1: told me that she sees these mom run accounts of
• 48:59
  Speaker 1: young girls a sensibly a platform to share their daughters
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: like modeling pictures or like gymnastics pictures. But when you
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: click in, as you were saying, the people who are
• 49:10
  Speaker 1: following that page are grown men. The people who are
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: saving the images. So if you post something on TikTok
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: or post something on Instagram so you can see who
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: saves it, the people saving that are grown men. And
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: when you click into these profiles of the people following,
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: oftentimes it's like not it doesn't take you know, a
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: detective to see like, okay, this is an image of
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: a grown man. Who are they following accounts like hot
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: young bikini girls things like that, Like it's pretty clear
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: what's going on. And then these men will leave comments
• 49:41
  Speaker 1: on pictures of their kids that are like wow, what
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: a hot picture, and mom will go in and like
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: that comment, right, And so it's sort of this weird
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: thing where it's done under this kind of like plausible
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: deniability of like, oh, it's just a modeling page, like
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: you're the one sexualizing my kid. But come on, like,
• 49:58
  Speaker 1: you you know what this is is. I've even seen
• 50:02
  Speaker 1: some of these accounts go so far as to sell
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: images of like you want to buy a photo set
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: of my daughter's gymnastic pictures or even buy their used clothing,
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: like we know, like we all see what's happening. They
• 50:16
  Speaker 1: can they can hide behind this is a modeling thing,
• 50:20
  Speaker 1: you know, this is you know whatever, It's clear what's
• 50:23
  Speaker 1: going on. You are making money from exploiting your kid,
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: and that is just what's happening. I think, at the
• 50:29
  Speaker 1: very least, let's just call it what it is. Don't
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: dance around it, don't use this this plausible deniability. Everyone
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: knows what's going on. Cut the crap. You know. We
• 50:51
  Speaker 1: recently did an episode on YouTube and this is a
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: very similar situation happening where there are videos of young kids,
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: mostly young girls, and getting several comments like this from
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: grown men. And as we've been alluding to this whole time,
• 51:10
  Speaker 1: there aren't specific laws in place to protect kids from this. Correct,
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: that's right, And so when you think about it, it's
• 51:20
  Speaker 1: kind of weird that there's not right, Like when it
• 51:22
  Speaker 1: comes to kids making money off of their labor we
• 51:25
  Speaker 1: have all kinds of rules and policies and regulations in
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: place here in the United States. You know, media companies
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: that work with kids for like films or commercials or
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: modeling or whatever, they have very strict labor laws like
• 51:37
  Speaker 1: I used to do, like child modeling and child acting
• 51:40
  Speaker 1: when I was a kid. Like they have very very
• 51:43
  Speaker 1: specific labor laws. But the Fair Labor Standards Act, a
• 51:48
  Speaker 1: nineteen thirty eight law that addresses excessive child labor, and
• 51:52
  Speaker 1: the California Coogan Act, which protects child actors. Neither of
• 51:55
  Speaker 1: those have been updated to include children online, like the
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: children of influencers, children who are being used as content.
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: And so it is definitely a situation where our technology
• 52:06
  Speaker 1: has advanced quicker than our laws have because they're currently
• 52:09
  Speaker 1: zero laws that in the United States that regulate how
• 52:12
  Speaker 1: children work on social media and how they can appear
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: in ads on social media that generate money, but that
• 52:19
  Speaker 1: actually might be changing soon. Morgan Sung reported that an
• 52:22
  Speaker 1: eighteen year old college student named Chris McCarty wanted to
• 52:26
  Speaker 1: advocate for kids rights to privacy after learning about that
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: influencer Mica Stelfer, the one who you might recall we
• 52:32
  Speaker 1: were just talking about she wanted to adopt a special
• 52:35
  Speaker 1: needs child. She did adopt that child, extensively shared intimate
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: content about the health needs of her adopted child before
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: deciding that those medical needs were too much and having
• 52:47
  Speaker 1: him quote rehomed. As she put it, well, that inspired
• 52:51
  Speaker 1: Chris McCarty to start advocating for the way that kids
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: are used online and like advocating for protections for these kids,
• 52:58
  Speaker 1: McCarty started to say quit Clicking Kids, which is described
• 53:02
  Speaker 1: as an advocacy and education site to combat the monetization
• 53:05
  Speaker 1: of children on social media, and when Chris was a senior,
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: they could emailed like a bunch of lawmakers and eventually
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: ended up working with Representative Emily Wis to craft HB
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: sixteen twenty seven, which is a bill that would protect
• 53:18
  Speaker 1: quote the interests of minor children featured on for profit
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: family laws by requiring the parents of kid influencers to
• 53:24
  Speaker 1: set aside part of that revenue from their content into
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: a separate fund so that their kids could access them
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: into adulthood. And it would also grant the children of
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: influencers the right to request the permanent deletion of their likenesses, names,
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: or photos from any Internet platform or network. That provided
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: compensation to the individual's parent or parents in exchange for
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: that content, and so platforms under this new legislation, platforms
• 53:48
  Speaker 1: would have to take reasonable steps to permanently delete video
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: segments of such children. That was one of the things
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: that like in researching for this episode and reading the
• 53:57
  Speaker 1: accounts of young people who were the used solely, like
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: they were the sole focus of their parents content. One
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: of the things that they say is I can't delete
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: it from me. I had no choice in the matter.
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: I was not able to consent. And now when you
• 54:12
  Speaker 1: google my name, all this stuff, intimate stuff comes up
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: about me, intimate stuff about my health, my body, my life,
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: all comes up, and there is no way to remove it.
• 54:21
  Speaker 1: And so I don't know how this legislation will shake out.
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: I'll keep you posted, but I do think it's it's
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: time that we really had our laws and our norms
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: catch up with where we are technologically. And I think,
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: you know, I think I think it's time. You would
• 54:39
  Speaker 1: think that we would have learned through the child actors stuff,
• 54:42
  Speaker 1: all the young actresses that had either the money stolen
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: or gone through so much abuse, all those things that
• 54:48
  Speaker 1: you would you would have thought, yeah, we would learn
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: from those mistakes because some of these young kids making
• 54:55
  Speaker 1: multimillions of dollars, so that you would think that with
• 54:57
  Speaker 1: that kind of revenue, which is which is rare, but
• 55:00
  Speaker 1: those are the ones who arguing the money, are the
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: younger kids at this point in time, that we would
• 55:05
  Speaker 1: actually found a way by now that would protect these
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: kids because inevitably they're the ones who kind of bring
• 55:14
  Speaker 1: it to bring it to as it is, like we're not.
• 55:17
  Speaker 1: It's not the older people who are creating these new
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: things and new new trends and new ways of communicating,
• 55:24
  Speaker 1: as the younger kids who are doing this and learning
• 55:27
  Speaker 1: how to do it better and or being used for it,
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: like it's one of those things they like it should
• 55:33
  Speaker 1: be for them, So why wouldn't it are automatically protect
• 55:37
  Speaker 1: them Exactly? Like I love cute kids on the internet
• 55:40
  Speaker 1: as much as anybody else in a healthy way, but
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: like corn Kid, I don't know if you guys remember
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: corn Kid. He was just like adorable little kid who
• 55:47
  Speaker 1: was interviewed at a state bear eating corn and who
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: was like when I had it with butter, everything changed
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: and he was like an overnight sensation. And I remember
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: thinking like, oh, what happened to Corn Kid? How is
• 55:57
  Speaker 1: he doing? And Corn Kid is quote retired, And I
• 56:01
  Speaker 1: just loved that, you know, somebody in his life was like, hey,
• 56:06
  Speaker 1: this you we've had this overnight unexpected viral fame, but
• 56:10
  Speaker 1: you can retire. You know, this doesn't have to be
• 56:12
  Speaker 1: something that you, you know, do, This doesn't have to
• 56:15
  Speaker 1: be something I think I think I did say that
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: he was on cameo, But this doesn't have to be
• 56:19
  Speaker 1: something that you you know, make your entire identity and
• 56:23
  Speaker 1: you're just a kid, you don't you don't have to,
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: you know, decide to go into internet social media stardom,
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: entertaining strangers because you had this one viral moment. And
• 56:33
  Speaker 1: so I really really hardened me to see that somebody
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: in his life gave him the space and the language
• 56:39
  Speaker 1: of being like, oh yeah, I'm retired as corn Kid
• 56:42
  Speaker 1: to make a choice for himself and protect his protect
• 56:46
  Speaker 1: his identity a little bit, protect protect his peace, because
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: I do think, like, yeah, the Internet is forever, and
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: I really feel for these kids who don't get a
• 56:56
  Speaker 1: choice in becoming these Internet stars and have to live
• 57:02
  Speaker 1: with it for life. And I think, you know, I
• 57:04
  Speaker 1: do think the tide is turning a little bit. I
• 57:06
  Speaker 1: think that we're seeing more and more one more and
• 57:09
  Speaker 1: more children who were used in this way as content
• 57:13
  Speaker 1: speaking up about what that experience was like for them.
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: And I think we're seeing more and more influencers stop
• 57:18
  Speaker 1: showing their kids on social media or do so in
• 57:20
  Speaker 1: ways that are a little bit more thoughtful. Right, So
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: you'll see influencers not showing their kids face or including
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: their kids and their content, but just showing their hands
• 57:29
  Speaker 1: the back of their head, so that it's not just
• 57:31
  Speaker 1: you know, performing on command for the entertainment and monetization
• 57:38
  Speaker 1: of your platform. Right. And you know, I think it
• 57:42
  Speaker 1: cut people took a page out of those big celebrities
• 57:45
  Speaker 1: who realize who lived in the limelight. We're like, we're
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: not putting our children through that, and go through everything
• 57:51
  Speaker 1: to try to cover at least like protect their identities.
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: And I've done so much better recently. I mean not some,
• 57:58
  Speaker 1: but you know, and then they're learning this is could
• 58:00
  Speaker 1: be really damaging, like you said, and that corn kid
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: so cute. He literally I think they asked him much
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: later after everything went viral, like what are your friends
• 58:09
  Speaker 1: think of that? And they're like, my friends don't know.
• 58:10
  Speaker 1: They don't know anything about this because the parents did
• 58:13
  Speaker 1: such a great job in keeping him isolated away from
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: all of that because they didn't want him to be scrutinized,
• 58:19
  Speaker 1: made fun of or any of that. Because so many
• 58:21
  Speaker 1: of them because he kind of I guess is it
• 58:22
  Speaker 1: a mame was the amazing gifts? Maybe eventually became that
• 58:26
  Speaker 1: that so many of those goods who were gifts or
• 58:29
  Speaker 1: memes were really humiliated as adults. Yeah, Like I think
• 58:33
  Speaker 1: it was BuzzFeed doing a series of what happened after
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: these people became memes. They actually have a really good one.
• 58:41
  Speaker 1: If you remember the girl this is gonna maybe date me,
• 58:43
  Speaker 1: and people who are younger gonna be like, what are
• 58:45
  Speaker 1: you talking about? The girl who was photographed with pigtails
• 58:48
  Speaker 1: and in a headgear holding goosebumps books if you if
• 58:53
  Speaker 1: she is a very her story is very fascinating. But yeah,
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: it's like these these people that we see on the internet,
• 59:01
  Speaker 1: and because we're engaging with them through a screen, we
• 59:03
  Speaker 1: can kind of forget that they're real people who have
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: to go on to live real lives in the real world,
• 59:08
  Speaker 1: or they don't just exist frozen in time. In this
• 59:11
  Speaker 1: meme where we first encountered them. They are real people. Yeah, her, Well,
• 59:22
  Speaker 1: as always, this has been so informative, Bridget. Thanks for
• 59:25
  Speaker 1: bringing it to our attention. Thanks for making the time
• 59:28
  Speaker 1: to come on. And I'm sure we'll update on this
• 59:31
  Speaker 1: one because clearly we all have a lot of thoughts
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: about this, so we would love to come back to
• 59:36
  Speaker 1: this one. Well, where can the good listeners find you? Well,
• 59:40
  Speaker 1: you can find me over at my own podcast. There
• 59:43
  Speaker 1: are no girls on the internet. The episode that we
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: did with Mom uncharted super interesting. She's just a really
• 59:47
  Speaker 1: interesting person. I would definitely recommend checking it out. Can
• 59:50
  Speaker 1: follow me on Twitter at Bridget Marie, on Instagram at
• 59:53
  Speaker 1: Bridget Marie in DC, or on TikTok at bridget Mixed Podcasts. Yes,
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: love it, love go check all of those things out
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: if you haven't already, listeners, and yes, thank you again, Bridget.
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: Can't wait to do this again next month. Update on
• 1:00:09
  Speaker 1: the food as well. Yeah, maybe we'll do it from
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 1: Mexico City, but you all come visit. Oh, I would
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: love it. I just heard an invitation. I'm coming. The
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 1: bags are getting backed, the bags are getting hearted in Mexico. Oh,
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 1: I can't wait. Well, listeners, if you would like to
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: contact us that you can our emails, Stuff Mediami, Stuff
• 1:00:31
  Speaker 1: at ihartmedia dot com. You can find us on Twitter
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 1: at Moms of Podcast or Instagram and TikTok at stuff
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 1: on Ever Told You. Thanks as always to our superproducer
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 1: Christina the best, the best, and thanks to you for
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 1: listening stuff one Ever Told You subjection I Heart Radio.
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: For more podcast in my Heart Radio, you can check
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: out the Radio ap Apple Podcast wherever you listen to
• 1:00:49
  Speaker 1: your favorite shows