The share button…

Just because you have a cute son, daughter, nephew, niece, grandson or granddaughter it isn’t a good reason to plaster pictures of him or her all over Facebook. Apart from the fact that they are out there for ever, can come back to haunt or be used against the child in a future that none of us can see, it’s also dangerous.

You know, try as I might I can’t find a picture of Jimmy Savile as a child on the web. There must be some gathering dust in a family album somewhere; all dark leaved sugar paper and photo hinges and, although this isn’t my point, better there than on Facebook. If there had been pictures of him as a child posted on Facebook they’d be all over the papers by now, just so we could see the evil in the eyes of the Savile brat… and we would see it wouldn’t we? We always do: ‘you can see he was always odd, just look in his eyes,’ we’d say.

And of course as I said yesterday; you can’t tell a Hitler, a Sutcliffe or Thatcher simply by looking at a childhood photograph. That sweet looking kid could just as easily grow up to massacre his classmates as become a medal-winning hero.

But there’s another much more important point I want to make that might make us all think twice about posting pictures of cute, sugar-dipped, children on the web.

Now, I’m not one to overly worry about these things for myself, after all I’m an adult and throwing me out there on the web for all to see is my choice. If it draws negative response and nastiness, even abuse - which it has at times - I think that I’m big enough to handle it. After all, it is my choice and I am an adult.

Unfortunately when we post pictures of young family or friends they have no choice at all, nor are they aren’t old enough to do anything about it. There they are for every aspect of the world to see, even paw at should they wish to.

‘No, it’s only a picture.’ I hear you say ‘It’s only there for my friends and family, there can’t be any harm in that, can there.’

Yes, you’d think not; but what about the ‘share’ button?

Not so long ago a mother posted a picture of her daughter on Facebook. Jessie and her friend looked so cute dressed in their Manchester United kits, so sweet with their sunny smiles; her Facebook friends were just going to love it.

One of Sharon’s friends, Annie, who was a learning support assistant at the same primary school where Sharon worked, liked it so much that she shared it with her Facebook friends too and they all loved it as well, commenting on what pretty girls they were and how cute they looked in their United football kits.

One of Annie’s friends, Maxine, who used to work with Annie as a teaching assistant at another school, shared it with her Facebook friends and suddenly hundreds of people were seeing these two innocent girls in their Manchester kits on Facebook.

The comments flew. How cute, adorable, gorgeous, so grown up, so pretty and full of life – like – like – like – like – like – like - like.

When Maxine, who was now a teaching assistant at a secondary school in Sowham, shared the picture of Jessica and Holly it went to her good friend Ian.

Ian liked it too.

I wonder why, in a world where we can’t even take pictures of our own children being angels in the school nativity, we feel it’s okay to post their pictures on Facebook? Why would we want the world to see our children, wouldn’t it be better to keep them close, send pictures privately by e-mail? Children aren’t kittens, which is another story, but how can we be sure who’s going to look at our pictures and how can we know what they are thinking as they look?

Of course these things happen, but after the police had arrested Ian Huntley they found the picture of Jessica and Holly in a folder on his computer. The folder was named ‘Share’.

Note: I was told this by a very old friend who is in a position to know. He also told me that this type of targeting is common. I see no reason to disbelieve him, but true or not it still should make us all think.