Instagram Punishment Gone Viral

[Kelmon]

For those who are not sure why this picture is bad..I will try to explain. Supplying an underage person alcohol is bad. The picture (apparently) was taken inside the house of the girls parents..and could be viewed as them supplying their underage daughter with alcohol (even if she snuck it, doesn't matter a bit). Children services could yank the child, police could fine/arrest the parents (probably wouldn't but they COULD), and who knows what else. So..yeah..that picture is bad.

Alright, okay, i see now it's a culture-specific issue. In my country, it's legal for parents/legal guardians to allow children to have alcohol when 14, legal drinking age (kids buying it on their own) is 16. Alcohol is accepted to the point that it's okay to - say - have a beer for lunch in your place of work.
The picture would be a non-issue here. I guess...a kid posing with weaponry or violent movies/videogames might elicit a strong reaction from us.

But be that as it may - i don't see public humiliation as a good parenting tool. Educate about social media, don't punish someone who doesn't know any better.

[Parvenu]

I had my first drink when I was younger then this girl. I think I was 11/12, wasn't anything to hard, little more then a small glass of light perry to toast New Year in. I had drunk inside a pub before legal drinking age (with my parents permission and about 6 months before I was legal). I grew up with the attitude that alcohol was good if you drank responsibly and within your own limits. Without the mystery of the whole drinking culture I never did the binge drinking or partied until I couldn't remember my name thing. It may be a cultural thing I know my country has a lower drinking age and other more relaxed laws around drinking then the USA.

Although I think the parent handled the situation well I believe education on the subject may have been (and may well have been done with the punishment) a better choice.

[MrsEclipse]

Another factor is the youth culture in America doesn't see alcohol as a drink, most of it sees it as an opportunity to get shit-faced and party. It's likely that the girl didn't mean her statement as, "I want to have a drink that contains alcohol," but instead, "I want to go wild and get plastered." If that's not what she meant, it's likely that's what it would be interpreted as by other people in the US, which means she isn't ready for social media because she isn't fully aware of the culture in which she's posting.

[siead_lietrathua]

i think the mom did a good job for the most part. she told the girl what is and is not acceptable, girl did something innaceptable, girl got punished.

i've seen the pic in question. the mom posted it as a waist-to-chin shot. you don't see the girl's face in it. at least the version that's gone viral. actually, to quote from the article

“She saw how this picture has gone viral, but … now she sees that if it had been the picture of vodka that went viral, it could have ruined her life,” Billingsley said Tuesday. “It’s vodka today, but it could be underwear five years from now if this isn’t nipped in the bud (and she doesn’t learn) the consequences of posting on social media.”

if her mom hadn't agreed to make an article over the matter, noone except those who knew the family already would have known who the individual girl was. that's the only part that bugs me a bit. the mom, in the end, removed the anonimity she gave her daughter when she left her face out of the pic by agreeing to be in an article about it.

[jackfaire]

You need a better example for your argument. A little kid that burns themselves on a hot stove doesn't know better. Curiosity takes over and they touch it.

This is a 12 year old kid that posted a pic saying "I Sure wish I could drink this" meaning full well that she knows that she cannot. She knows full well that she isn't allowed to even possess the bottle.

She wasn't punished for having the bottle. She wasn't punished for taking the picture. She was punished for posting the picture online something that is a situation in which she didn't know better as evidenced by her "OH MY GOD" reaction when her mom explained it to her while punishing her for not knowing.

I agree punish her for taking the bottle she knows better than to do that. However she didn't know better than to not post the picture online.

i think the mom did a good job for the most part. she told the girl what is and is not acceptable, girl did something innaceptable, girl got punished.

Well except for she didn't tell the Daughter what is and isn't acceptable until after the girl did it and then punished her for it.

That would be like never telling your kid "look both ways before crossing the street" Then punishing the child because they didn't look both ways before crossing the street.

[Andara Bledin]

Well except for she didn't tell the Daughter what is and isn't acceptable until after the girl did it and then punished her for it.

That's a major assumption to make and, honestly, isn't suggested by the rest of what has been stated regarding the incident.

In fact, it's contradicted in the very first sentence of the article that was linked to in the OP:

When ReShonda Tate Billingsley let her daughter open an Instagram account, the Houston novelist made clear to her what would be appropriate to post to the picture-sharing site.

It's hard to take a debate argument seriously when it's obvious that there wasn't much effort put into verifying that the assertions put forth haven't already been countered.

^-.-^

[siead_lietrathua]

Well except for she didn't tell the Daughter what is and isn't acceptable until after the girl did it and then punished her for it.

i'm sure when the mom was laying out the rules of what she could and couldn't post online, i'm sure the idea that not posting pics of things you aren't allowed to do came up. i'm certian if the kid was doing anything else she wasn't allowed to do other than touching liquor (like pics taken while she was skipping class, wearing clothes she isnt supposed to, etc), the kid would have been punished as well in a similar manner.

i am also fairly certian that the kid is not JUST being punished for takig the picture. if the kid going in the liquor cabinet/ touching the bottles at all is against the houe rules, then that is also being compounded into this punishment.


i don't get this intense dislike of embarrasment as a punishment. parents have been embarasing their kids for eons. miss the bus and your parents have to come home to take you to school? damn straight they will pull up right to the door, demand a hug AND kiss, and yell out as loud as possible how much they love you. embarrasment, for a teen, makes a much better life lesson than traditional punishments.

[bex1218]

i don't get this intense dislike of embarrasment as a punishment. parents have been embarasing their kids for eons. miss the bus and your parents have to come home to take you to school? damn straight they will pull up right to the door, demand a hug AND kiss, and yell out as loud as possible how much they love you. embarrasment, for a teen, makes a much better life lesson than traditional punishments.

Not every kid/teen learns from the same punishment as another. Sometimes it works, sometimes it backfires. Parents just gotta learn how to handle it.

[siead_lietrathua]

Not every kid/teen learns from the same punishment as another. Sometimes it works, sometimes it backfires. Parents just gotta learn how to handle it.

well, for this kid, it seems to have worked. at least from the article posted. so maybe we should just trust that the mom, in this situation, knew what to do to handle her kid.

[jackfaire]

i don't get this intense dislike of embarrasment as a punishment. parents have been embarasing their kids for eons. miss the bus and your parents have to come home to take you to school? damn straight they will pull up right to the door, demand a hug AND kiss, and yell out as loud as possible how much they love you. embarrasment, for a teen, makes a much better life lesson than traditional punishments.

Because in my years as a kid being humiliated and embarrassed as punishment never worked. It either meant now not only was I being bullied at school but now my parents were bullying me too but also I never stopped the behaviors I just got better about not being caught you know until friends educated me as to the consequences of my actions instead of trying to embarrass me.

It's hard to take a debate argument seriously when it's obvious that there wasn't much effort put into verifying that the assertions put forth haven't already been countered.

^-.-^

That says she told her what was considered acceptable. Fine I will clarify. She wasn't told why. There is no mention that her mom explained the dangers.

If someone tells you that you can't or shouldn't do something but never explains why it's a bad idea then why would you listen?

How many kids are told, "Don't do this" but not told why

Much of childhood at least mine was doing things my parents told me not to and then finding out after I was punished why they are a bad idea.

What's funny is if they had explained the Why to me in the first place I wouldn't have freaking done them.

"Don't steal" Yeah whatever "Wait you mean I can actually go to jail for stealing even though I am a kid well fuck"

This is my problem with much of these punishments giving kids a what not to do without giving them a why or helping them understand why it's a bad idea then punishing them when they do it.

The reaction to being punished for it is often to just be better about not getting caught because the why not to do it has nothing to do with any real reason and is all about being punished.

If being punished is the only consequence to my action then the punishment better outweigh the reward of the thing I am not supposed to do or someone needs to explain to me why it's not a good idea in real world terms.

In other words, "When am I ever going to use this in real life?"

[Andara Bledin]

Because in my years as a kid being humiliated and embarrassed as punishment never worked.

She isn't you. What would work for you is likely not the same as what would work for her.

She wasn't told why. There is no mention that her mom explained the dangers.

Just because there is no mention of it doesn't mean that it didn't happen.

You're making a lot of assumptions about what you think happened without any evidence either way.

^-.-^

[bex1218]

well, for this kid, it seems to have worked. at least from the article posted. so maybe we should just trust that the mom, in this situation, knew what to do to handle her kid.

Good for the mom. I truely hope this kid will learn from it. Embarassment would never work on me, personally. It all depends on the wiring.

[Hyena Dandy]

I think if I was 12, I may have gotten confused if the instructions weren't explicit enough. If she's told "Don't take pictures of something you're not allowed to do" and that list includes "Drinking alcohol," then I could, especially to a 12 year old, very easily see that being interpreted as "Being upset about NOT being able to drink alcohol is alright."

I think that public humiliation is the wrong tact to take. The 'praise publically, punish privately' should apply to child-raising too. I never got scolded when visitors were around. Unless nothing ELSE has been shown to work (and that's a question, does she have a history of posting bad things) then making the punishment public isn't a problem.

I think that 'no longer able to be online' is an acceptable punishment (particularly if there's a history of this idiocy.) I think having a punishment at all is totally reasonable. What I think is not reasonable is the mother posting something to her daughter's page to embarrass her, as opposed to something that wouldn't be as, well, publically humiliating.

There is a very clear, emotional difference between how her mother did it, and if she had to post "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have posted it, and I'm not allowed online anymore."

I think in this case, and in the previous case, the punishment becomes the main point. It becomes about parental authority, rather than about the transgression. I really doubt she's going to learn anything from this. It's mocking her daughter, not just correcting her on the behavior.

At the same time... If she's been acting out, her mother's been trying to stop it. Or if she was told specifically that THIS would happen (not just 'you'll be in trouble' but specifically 'I will get on your account and tell everyone how you screwed up',) or any other sort of extenuating circumstance... Then that makes sense.

It's still not how I'd approach it, but that's a case where I don't think it's bad parenting. It's just a different system. There's really not enough to understand the dynamic between the mother and the daughter that led up to this.

[Ginger Tea]

Would it be equally inappropriate if she took a picture in front of a car, captioned "I wish I could drive that"?

Already dealt with I know, but the phrase Apples and Oranges and the comparing thereof come to mind.

Being too young to drive but wishing to aspire to being able to drive and attain the independance a car can give vs bus time tables and long winding commutes, is way different than starting a count down till you are of your own countries legal drinking age.

When I saw that image first time round late last month earlier this, I thought it was a college age person chastised for some drunk (perhaps still under age) party photo that got out on the net and the parents found out about it and could have sworn there was a face attatched not just the chin, so then finding it was a child just assumed as it had gone viral that the one I saw was a meme copy, but after clicking the link, I do belive it is the same image, this time with a story behind the picture.

WTFIWWY the live edition normally has Terra state that people today don't know how long this kinda image is going to hang around for and sooner or later the party fails from ichcb after dark will come back to haunt someone somewhere.

There are some incriminating photo's of me back in 97ish all but naked in a graveyard right next door to a police station, if facebook was a thing then, I think the plod might have something to say about it, they still might, but I don't think those photo's ever made it as a jpg.
I am surprised that the shots taken on my camera were printed, developed yes, printed no, they once refused a print of one of our dogs on her back showing the world she was a bitch not a dog, so me naked I expected to not be included in the set.
And iir my mum was the one to pick them up, although I think I said at the time there may be some unsuitable shots (to the shop and my mum).

Mind you my bits on display in photographic form would be nothing new, my dad had a toddler pic of me printed up HUGE sat on a milk float peddal car with nothing on from the waist down, it wasn't something brought out to embarras me at any time, no it was hung up for anyone in the room to see.