An invasion of privacy

[seabeyond]

http://betweenfriendsblog.typepad.com/.a/6a00d8354c22ad69e20167654bdedc970b-800wi


I don't recall if anything in particular happened to inspire this cartoon from 2009 but this is a subject that is an issue with me. I think our society has an astounding lack of privacy. Anyone, anywhere at almost anytime can be recorded and then splashed over the internet for all time. A person can be having a bad day, an intimate moment, an emotional crisis, having a wardrobe malfunction or can even be in mid-chew...and be at the mercy at some inconsiderate boob with a cell phone. It bothers me when I see photos splashed around the internet of little Suri Cruise (Tom Cruise's daughter) when she's tired and in her mother's arms or when she's upset or even just out walking with her parents. What's worse are the captions under every photo...the critical comments because she's wearing little high heels. They sell those little shoes in every toy store in America...the kid is playing dress-up for Pete's sake...leave her alone!

I saw a photo on facebook once...it was a photo of a mom and dad and a toddler sitting at a table in a fast food restaurant. The toddler was crying and having a tantrum, the mother and father were obviously agitated and reacting to the tantrum. They both looked tired. The expressions that were immortalized by some moron sitting near them with a cell phone were less than flattering. And then the comments under the photo...they were critical and mocking and mean.

This infuriates me. My kids are older now but I felt nothing but empathy for that young family. I've been there...I've had a crusher day with a killer deadline, my husband has had an extremely busy day at work, maybe having been called out during the night (my husband is a Funeral Director) and not had much sleep, a child who is maybe tired or has a cold coming on. And we decide to go out for a burger to make life a little easier...but it backfires. And what was supposed to help only makes things worse.

That's what I thought about when I saw that photo. This family of private citizens were just trying to get through a bad day and someone recorded the moment and threw it up on their facebook page for some very low-brow entertainment. I know that's the world we live in now but I don't think it's right.

http://betweenfriendsblog.typepad.com/between_friends_blog/sunday_favourites/


i put the article up for the cartoon. sigh.... we cant get it to copy onto this post. bummer

[DCKit]

1. Do what my dad did..."I'll never take you animals out in public"

I'm sure it saved him thousands of dolllars. I have no relationship with him, the needy ones do.

[seabeyond]

2. ah, that is sad. i had a fine time with kids out and about. but, we pretty much made sure

they were in shape to go out and we didnt go out often.