When the Children's Convention becomes Swedish law in 2020, one of the consequences may be that one looks at whether parents are allowed to share pictures of their children in social media.
Are we so judgmental that they need a law for this?
After all, there are families who show their everyday lives on youtube and that attract thousands of people to watch, and who may succeed in that delicate balance.
But then there are custodians who expose the most private situations on youtube, Instagram and Facebook and more, and then it turns in my stomach.
Would you put your family's photo album in a public cafe and let everyone who wants to check on your child while sleeping in their bed, bathe at home in the bathtub or hug you crying after a whirl on the bike?
Sometimes it feels like we have lost respect for our children as individuals.
If I express my thoughts when I hang out with my mom and then surf the net, I would be genuinely angry or disappointed if I found quotes from what I said, just because she thought I expressed something "cute". And besides, she only said this to her, and then not automatically to her friends.
If she still wants to reproduce what I said, I expect her to ask me before she publishes something - with or without law. Everything else would be disrespectful.
Many families who choose to live their lives on social media have big kids, but the smaller kids - do they have any chance to even answer "yes" or "no"?
Do you think they can overlook the consequences? Even journalists usually have a read through quotes before the interview is published.
Do adults think they own the children's identity and get it the way they want in social media?
Deliver me into the feeling that as a child, I am trusting and vulnerable talking to my closest friends who are in the room.
Then maybe I fall asleep. Then I am quoted in my vulnerability and also photographed or filmed while sleeping and laid out. What happens to the trust and confidence?
We adults have to think about the boundary of what is okay to share or not.
If we are in a playground with our children, many people can see them, even people we do not know. Yes, then it can be a yardstick if you feel you've lost the inner compass.
Thus, such a picture is no great weirdo to share. Who do you want to put your baby in the evening and sit next to when they sleep? Yes, those people you can probably share a picture for with the same motive.
Who can be with you when you bathe your child? Yes, the same people can then see pictures from the tub. Approximately. Just like a compass.
If you want your child to find their boundaries and say no when someone goes over them, they may be wise to start by respecting your child's integrity.
There is a difference between private and personal.
If you have a larger child you can always ask if they are comfortable with the picture or the quotes, now you have the opportunity, later you may be forced - by law.