There’s something that strikes us as a little gross, the way politicians trot out their families to win elections, to humanize themselves or get sympathy when they screw up. There’s something exploitative about the way celebrities use pregnancy announcements or events in their kids’ life to get publicity. And there’s something plain weird about the way that some influencers turn their kids into content.

We see these things and we judge. We tell ourselves we’d do it differently. Maybe we even pity their kids.

And then what do we do? We get back to posting about our own kids on social media. For free! For imaginary internet points and validation! For the benefit of these multi-billion dollar tech companies and their ‘daily active user’ count.

At least the pros are getting paid for it. At least their kids have a chance to be nepo babies. Or have a chance to inherit whatever their parents got paid by People Magazine for the exclusive photos. Us? We’re just doing it because we can’t seem to stop ourselves from doing it.

Your kids deserve a private life. They deserve a present parent, not one who is always filming or recording them to show random people on the internet. You deserve to be a present parent, to enjoy the time you guys spend together as time you spend together, not grist for the content mill.

Put the phone down. Or at least, try to keep most of what you capture with it inside the family. It’s to everyone’s benefit.