Maria Foy.
Photo: supplied
On 10 June 2024, Maria Foy posted a comment on her Facebook page to half a million followers. They probably knew her better by her online brand, Happy Mum Happy Child.
It was honest, a key tenet of Foy’s nature that propelled her to one of New Zealand’s most popular ‘mumfluencers’ when social media felt sparkly and new in the 2010s.
“After thinking long and hard about this I feel it’s time to pivot from this thing I started almost 10 years ago as my children are older now, and they don’t want to be shown on social media in the same way they were as young kids.”
Foy accidentally started a successful brand out of being a fun, creative, sometimes goofy and always honest mum. Her posts were seen by thousands and could also make thousands of dollars from brands as well as oodles of free product.
Her two kids unknowingly came along for the ride. They appeared in countless images and videos, capturing everything from mundane chores like folding laundry to free overseas holidays.
“I was constantly pinching myself that I was in this position where I could suddenly start contributing to the family,” Foy says of the now-legitimate career that gave her the flexibility to stay home with kids.
Like many other children of parent influencers, Foy’s kids are now of an age where they can grasp the digital footprint their parents created for them. Some like it. Some don’t care. Others hate it.
In the US, some children are vocally criticising their parents’ decision to let thousands of strangers in on their intimate childhood moments. At least three states have passed laws ensuring children appearing in paid social media posts with their parents get a slice of the income. That’s something Foy started doing for her kids years ago.
In the age of deepfake AI images, online predators and privacy violations by hackers and big tech, posting images of your kids online has become more complicated – even dangerous. That is amplified for mums and dads who have made content empires from being parents.
“I’ve always asked them prior to posting anything and before the answer would be ‘yes’,” Foy says. “Now the answer is most likely to be ‘no’.”
“My son and I have an agreement where I will never post a photo of him online. He doesn’t really like his photo being taken and that’s cool.”
Early on with Happy Mum Happy Child, Foy devised some rules for herself like not posting images of her children when they were struggling through a tantrum. However, she understands there will be a future reckoning as her children grow older and get a deeper understanding of their online existence.
Melissa Jack started a blog in 2007 posting about her first baby and baking and other parenting things. Starting an Instagram account in 2010 was a natural extension.
“I never imagined that Instagram would actually generate any sort of income at that point.”
When her second son was born in 2013 she decided to try and make an income as a social media influencer in the parenting space. It worked.
“We all were quite happy to share our kids’ lives and perhaps, we didn’t give it enough thought at the time, but I think we were so new to it that we didn’t foresee anything sinister that could go along with it.”
She chatted with other parenting influencers online, including Foy, about how to navigate this new world. Often parenting influencers would be on a job or a trip together, making them like freelance co-workers.
There were times of stress when Jack was doing content for multiple advertisers. And there were days where kids would be kids.
Pioneer social media influencer Melissa Jack.
Photo: supplied
“Your whole job was about getting the aesthetic right and getting the right shot and if your child wasn’t feeling it that day, and just wouldn’t co-operate… It’s just like any other job. You had deadlines.”
Now, Jack is working full-time as a personal trainer again. Her Instagram feed is mostly focused on the gym or mountain biking with the occasional paid post.
Recently, an offer came through for her son to be involved in an advertising post with an income that would have afforded him new mountain bike gear. He declined.
“It was for a toy company actually and it wasn’t something that felt authentic to him… he wasn’t like, ‘I’m just going to take all these photos of me with this product that I don’t really even like and let’s pretend that I do like it.’ That didn’t sit well with him.”
Cam Barrett, 25, is an American victim of “sharenting” (a mashup of sharing and parenting). Her tantrums, medical diagnosis and even when she got her first period were spun into public Facebook posts by her mother to hook potential brand sponsors.
“A lot of my friends and their parents had social media, so it was super embarrassing,” Barrett told CNN earlier this year.
A predator who followed the social media account run by Barrett’s mum wrote a message that he was following the then-12-year-old child when she biked home from school.
Barrett, now a social media strategist, is advocating for law changes in about a dozen US states that would see children receive some of the income their parents make through social media. They should also have the freedom to later delete images of themselves that their parents post, Barrett argues.
Two months ago, California updated a law protecting child actors to include children of parenting influencers.
Leanne Ross, the chief customer officer at online safety organisation Netsafe, isn’t aware of any similar laws being floated in New Zealand. However, research by Netsafe shows a generational divide between the oversharing of parents and the cravings for privacy of today’s young people.
Leanne Ross from Netsafe.
Photo: supplied
Ross is not a parenting influencer, but even she is facing a reckoning with her teenagers over what she shared online about their childhood.
“I imagine there’s probably all sorts of feelings if you commercialised it. ‘Was I used to make money? Was that trip to Disneyland real? Are those photos contrived or really my childhood memories?’ I imagine it’s very complex emotionally and psychologically for those kids.”
Teenage focus groups conducted by Netsafe found that young people are annoyed by the poor role modelling of their parents’ online worlds.
“They’re like ‘my mummy followed all these mummy influencers and she thinks she has to take photos of us all dressed in the same outfits at Christmas beside the tree and put them on Instagram living this perfect life’ and they don’t want to partake in that.”
Ross has noticed that a new generation of TikTok parenting influencers doesn’t post as many images of their children’s faces as yesteryear’s influencers, but they’re still talking about their children in a personal way, which could backfire later.
“We’ve definitely made progress in terms of understanding how to protect children…but equally, there’s a lot more that we still need to learn and do better as parents.”
There’s are new harms that can impact old and new content – deep fake images generated by AI and more sophisticated online predators and hackers.
Holly Brooker, a presenter at support organisation the Parenting Place, advises parents eyeing the influencer scene to set themselves boundaries early on regarding what they will and won’t share about their child’s life. They should also think critically about every image or story they share with present and future eyes. Who’s following them online is another consideration.
“They want to be really mindful to avoid sharing identifiable details such as school uniforms, addresses or daily routines because predators can use what might seem innocent information to locate or target children.”
Foy is ready to move on from an identity focused on parenting. She has rebranded her Instagram account under her own name and has launched a new website. She continues to be open about her mental health journey as well as a new experience her followers will relate to – perimenopause.
She occasionally posts an image of her daughter or a memory from years ago – but only if her kid gives consent. Foy has removed more recent images of her son who revoked consent.
“I think at the end of the day, not showing kids online is the ultimate goal. I realise that by saying that I’m opening myself up to criticism because I made a decision but I’m aware of what I did and I’ll have to live with the music.”
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