FTM here, how to get my mother to understand Facebook privacy re: the baby?

[Anonymous]

I am the 6:10 poster, 30 yrs old and set to friends only setting as well. What OP is describing is far more obsessive than that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am pretty sure everyone on her that is so psycho about fb privacy settings is 34 or older. Sure there will be some exceptions but I am 30 and no one I know acts like this.

I am 34 and what you would probably deem "psycho" about my facebook privacy settings. However, I'm pretty much the only person in my group of friends who is like that, and some of them are older than me. I just don't get why anyone would make their settings anything other than "friends only" -- don't get the point. I own my own business and like to keep my personal life (boring as it may be) private, just out of principle.

I can't think of a single reason why I would want to share the intricacies of my life with the whole world. Maybe you can enlighten me? I'm curious.

that isnt the issue. what is the harm in letting a proud grandmother posts photos of her grandbaby so her old lady friends can see it? why would anyone possibly care/?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am pretty sure everyone on her that is so psycho about fb privacy settings is 34 or older. Sure there will be some exceptions but I am 30 and no one I know acts like this.

I am 34 and what you would probably deem "psycho" about my facebook privacy settings. However, I'm pretty much the only person in my group of friends who is like that, and some of them are older than me. I just don't get why anyone would make their settings anything other than "friends only" -- don't get the point. I own my own business and like to keep my personal life (boring as it may be) private, just out of principle.

I can't think of a single reason why I would want to share the intricacies of my life with the whole world. Maybe you can enlighten me? I'm curious.

that isnt the issue. what is the harm in letting a proud grandmother posts photos of her grandbaby so her old lady friends can see it? why would anyone possibly care/?

You may have missed that the OP said her mother's FB page is public. Anyone can see what she posts.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am pretty sure everyone on her that is so psycho about fb privacy settings is 34 or older. Sure there will be some exceptions but I am 30 and no one I know acts like this.

I am 34 and what you would probably deem "psycho" about my facebook privacy settings. However, I'm pretty much the only person in my group of friends who is like that, and some of them are older than me. I just don't get why anyone would make their settings anything other than "friends only" -- don't get the point. I own my own business and like to keep my personal life (boring as it may be) private, just out of principle.

I can't think of a single reason why I would want to share the intricacies of my life with the whole world. Maybe you can enlighten me? I'm curious.

that isnt the issue. what is the harm in letting a proud grandmother posts photos of her grandbaby so her old lady friends can see it? why would anyone possibly care/?

You may have missed that the OP said her mother's FB page is public. Anyone can see what she posts.

again, what is the issue? there are 2 billion babies on this planet - no one gives a shit about your kid's photo. (except for the proud grandmom)

[Anonymous]

I said I will not post any more pictures of you any where
if that's not enough you'll have to remove me from your friends list

ok, if that's what you want, then you are choosing it
i am not forcing that upon you
i want to be clear that you are making this choice

Here's the problem, OP - I agree your Mom is immature, but she said she wouldn't repost any more pictures. What the hell else do you expect? You obviously think that's not enough, because YOU (not her) chose to cut her off, but I'm at a loss for what she could have done.

She did what you asked, and you still cut her off from FB (while trying to put it off on her). That's just as immature as she is.

[Anonymous]

OP here. I just want to thank everyone for responses, including those who agree AND those who think I'm coming across as nutty. Parenting and FB are both relatively new to me, so I need help understanding whether I'm coming across as reasonable.

My mom and I had not discussed baby pics before, but we've battled over her non-facebook PUBLIC website she keeps, on which posts medical information and details about her family, including me. I made her remove me from the website a few years ago, and it was a huge issue. As a result, when I joined facebook, she was pretty circumspect re: me. This weekend, I sent the pic in question (of me dressed up for an event but highlighting the "baby bump") to my father. She texted (woman hates phone calls) me to ask why she didn't get a copy and promising if she would she wouldn't share it on facebook. The next day, she then took it from my facebook page (which I didn't know she could do and can't figure out how to prevent) and posted it to hers. So I contacted her saying that I thought we had a deal, and that I wanted to clarify my comfort level about sharing photos before baby pics arrive. I agree with PPs who said that I shouldn't have used this opportunity to start that convo and it was passive aggressive. I was just trying to nip things in the bud without accusing her of doing something wrong since I hadn't been clear yet.

I think, so far, that my intuition is that the "proud grandma" -- in theory -- should be able to share pics with her friends on facebook so long as they aren't accompanied by address or identifying information (other than first name). However, that is on the assumption that she is sharing with her "friends." As I mentioned before, my mother's page is NOT "friends-only" access, PLUS she "befriends" people she has never met before. Which means, she is not sharing pictures with her friends. She is sharing them more widely. So, when I do have a chance to discuss with her, I want to take the position that she must lock down her page access to people she actually knows and then posting pics of me and baby (without ID'ing info) is okay.

As a side note, I cannot for the life of me figure out how to make a pic I post "unshareable" and "undownloadable." Any tips?

Of course, as many of you have identified, having this discussion rationally with my mother is itself a chore. I have tried very hard in recent years to distance myself from my mother's craziness and immaturity, which results in barely speaking to her. Being pregnant with a daughter myself is causing lots of new conflicts and feelings. I want to be a more mature and reasonable adult than she is, and I wanted advice on whether I was succeeding. Looks like people disagree as to whether I am, which is fine and fair ... I am very seriously considering some light therapy to teach me coping techniques for my own parenting as well as interacting with her. I'm running out of time, though, before she really invades my life due to the baby's arrival.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

I said I will not post any more pictures of you any where
if that's not enough you'll have to remove me from your friends list

ok, if that's what you want, then you are choosing it
i am not forcing that upon you
i want to be clear that you are making this choice

Here's the problem, OP - I agree your Mom is immature, but she said she wouldn't repost any more pictures. What the hell else do you expect? You obviously think that's not enough, because YOU (not her) chose to cut her off, but I'm at a loss for what she could have done.

She did what you asked, and you still cut her off from FB (while trying to put it off on her). That's just as immature as she is.

OP here. To be fair, you're totally misreading my post. I said she couldn't post any more pics until we discussed proper privacy techniques. She responded that she didn't want to discuss it and instead would never take or share any pics ever again. To which I responded (multiple times) that I was not asking for that -- I do think that's unfair -- and I just wanted to have a reasonable discussion before she shares pictures with the world. I'm still FB friends with her. Maybe you think that's immature, too, which is your prerogative. But don't misjudge me based on mistaken facts.

[Anonymous]

I think you're overreacting because of your other issues with your Mom. I also think it's funny that you told her to STOP OVERREACTING in all caps.

You might want to try showing some patience with your Mom. If she does something that irritates you, think about whether it's really worth hurting her feelings and causing a bunch of trouble before you say mention it to her. This is stupid. If you don't want people to see your pictures, don't put them online.

[Anonymous]

What's an FTM?

[Anonymous]

OP, you really lost me at your "carefully controlled" FB page. Even with only 20 friends, anyone who has access to your page could copy your photo from Facebook and use it however they wish. If even your mom isn't doing what you'd expect or like with the pictures, who's to say everyone else is?

I think you're being pretty controlling here. There are a ton more decisions that will come up once you have the kid, where, if your parents live close by or ever watch the kids, you are not going to like how they are doing it. Try to work on getting over that now, and knowing when to put your foot down. (safety issues, etc.)

If you are concerned with the way your photos are shared, then don't share them with people who aren't doing it the way you want them to (which, in your case, means not sharing any photos on Facebook.) sorry. that's based on your stipulations here though.

[Anonymous]

Start a Shutterfly or Snapfish account where you can post pictures. If she wants to share with her friends, then have her give you their email addresses, so you can invite them to view your account. That way you'll have control over who sees the photos. We do this with our families.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Let me get this straight...you are complaining bc your mom shared a picture of your baby...but you have no problem posting an entire email thread/message that occurred between you two which more than likely your mother never meant to be shared and posted it to an Internet forum word for word?

This.

You sound controlling and annoying. Get over it FTM, in about 3 months you won't give a shit what pictures are on FB.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am pretty sure everyone on her that is so psycho about fb privacy settings is 34 or older. Sure there will be some exceptions but I am 30 and no one I know acts like this.

Nope, late 20's here and my settings are set to private/friends only for everything.

Yup me too!

[Anonymous]

OP, does your mom live close-by and/or visit often? Are you worried that even if you can control who is sharing the pictures that you post that she will take her own pictures and post those (which you can't control)? If that is the case, I think youneed to wait until the baby is born and rehash the conversation. Personally, I wouldn't care if my mom re-posted my pics but I know that she also wouldn't share inappropriate information along with the pics and it sounds like your mom might based on past behavior. My mother, on the other hand, is the opposite extreme and refuses to buy anything on-line with her credit card, but I digress...

I don't think you need to worry about it if she is just re-posting pictures for her friends to see--there is a lot more inappropriate stuff for people to see on FB than baby pictures. I would worry more about the pictures your daughter posts of herself once she gets her own account in a few years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I am pretty sure everyone on her that is so psycho about fb privacy settings is 34 or older. Sure there will be some exceptions but I am 30 and no one I know acts like this.

I am 34 and what you would probably deem "psycho" about my facebook privacy settings. However, I'm pretty much the only person in my group of friends who is like that, and some of them are older than me. I just don't get why anyone would make their settings anything other than "friends only" -- don't get the point. I own my own business and like to keep my personal life (boring as it may be) private, just out of principle.

I can't think of a single reason why I would want to share the intricacies of my life with the whole world. Maybe you can enlighten me? I'm curious.

that isnt the issue. what is the harm in letting a proud grandmother posts photos of her grandbaby so her old lady friends can see it? why would anyone possibly care/?

You may have missed that the OP said her mother's FB page is public. Anyone can see what she posts.

again, what is the issue? there are 2 billion babies on this planet - no one gives a shit about your kid's photo. (except for the proud grandmom)[/quote]

+1.

I want to add that I enjoyed the voyeurism aspect of reading the OP's email string. Makes me feel like a I have a friend in the "crazy mom text messages" realm of life.