Your comment post should be at least 400 words this week due Thursday by 11:59 pm (worth 70 points) and you will be responsible for responding (respectfully) to one of your classmates in at least a one paragraph reply entries by Sunday at 11:59 pm (worth 30 points).
Student Question | Should We Be Privy to the Lives of Celebrities’ Children?
APRIL 18, 2016 5:02 AM April 18, 2016 5:02 am
Blue Ivy, North West, Max Zuckerberg — the children of celebrities are often in the public eye, to the delight of their parents’ fans.
What do you think about this trend? Do you like knowing about — and seeing photographs of — the children of the famous? Is it fair to the children?
In “The Right to Privacy for Children Online,” Teddy Wayne expresses his opinion on celebrities who write about, share photographs or videos of or otherwise incorporate their children into offerings for their fans — and potential customers:
If I had a friend who told me he was starting a business named after his young child, I might find it cute, perhaps even touching. If he were using his son’s or daughter’s likeness as the logo (à la the Wendy’s franchise), I could understand how that might be fine, though I’d wonder how his offspring might react later to seeing his cartoon image plastered ubiquitously.
But if he also cast his child in commercials, and that was on top of a web campaign in which the little boy or girl was otherwise a prominent fixture, and if my friend already inhaled the rarefied air of the ultrarich and I suspected the deployment of the adorable tyke was a strategic showcase for his own relatability as a normal parent and a measure to downplay the crass commercialism of the enterprise — well, then I might be concerned.
And yet many parents on social media are doing much the same thing, albeit in less conspicuous fashion, and usually with a goal of praise, not profits.
We, too, are using our children on the Internet to burnish our personal brands, from the C.E.O. who wants to let everyone know she still takes the time to attend her child’s piano recital to the stay-at-home caregiver wanting recognition for his exhausting work.
… Less pettily, there are serious questions to be asked here about privacy and consent. For most children raised in analog eras, embarrassing Polaroids and stories were small-scale mortifications at worst. But now the possibility of mass exposure looms, and while most conscientious parents know better than to circulate, say, a photo of a child bathing, they do distribute other data that the young subject may someday wish had been kept confidential.
“It’s hard enough to get through puberty,” Amy Webb wrote, in a widely read 2013 essay on Slate, about a friend’s unfettered Facebook pictures of her 5-year-old daughter. “Why make hundreds of embarrassing, searchable photos freely available to her prospective homecoming dates?”
The 5-year-old clearly cannot approve with full understanding the uploading of these images, just as the only way Blue Ivy can refuse to endorse her mother’s marketing campaign is by throwing a temper tantrum. We have strict child labor laws, and I am certain that any applicable ones were upheld during Blue Ivy’s cameo. (I also imagine that she had fun.)
Students: Read the entire article, then tell us:
— Do you think celebrities use their children to “burnish their personal brands”?
— Do noncelebrity parents do the same thing, albeit on a smaller scale? Explain.
— Are you interested in what celebrities broadcast about their children? Why or why not?
— Do your parents use social media, and if so, do they share things about you and your siblings?
— If so, how do you feel about the way they portray you or the things they publicize about you?
I think that celebrities don't use their children to burnish their brand. Of course their children are in pictures and videos. But it is their children and they can do whatever they want to them. Before the celebrities had children they were already had a very successful brand. They don't need their children to advertise for them. For example Beyoncé and blue ivy, Beyoncé had a very successful career and a worldwide fan base. Sure her daughter is in some videos but she doesn't need to be. Beyoncé is successful and doesn't need her child to advertise for her for more people to listen to her music . Another example is mark zuckerberg and his son. He is a billionaire and is very successful. He doesn't need his son to help advertise if he was one of the biggest websites on the plant. I do think that non celebrities do this because they are just starting to be recognized by bigger companies so they will use there children to become more famous than other people. So yes I do think that smaller celebrities do this. I don't really care what celebrities do to their children, they could keep their children off social media or don't show them in public and I would care because it is the way they are taking care of them. And it is their choice and no one else. No my parents don't use social media. They have phones but they don't use Twitter,Facebook, or Instagram. Thank or else it would be embarrassing if they did have accounts.
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