Rise of the Internet Parents...

   It’s more than obvious how much the internet has changed our lives. People of my generation will never know what it’s like to completely lose touch with old classmates or spend hours looking for information in a pile of books because all of that is a click away and a seconds away (Depending on your ISP speeds). But today the one thing that does stand-out for me is the effect it has had on parenting. Apparently nobody saw this coming!

·         Punishment

Remember those days when you’d do something wrong and your parents would lecture you or beat you or take away something you loved so they could teach you a lesson? Those strategies only worked to a certain degree because some of us zoned-out through the talks, developed immunity to pain and learned to survive without those things we’ loved’. What does the internet parent do for effective and full-proof punishment? They just embarrass you on social media. Take for example the two stories below:

1.       Dad wears short shorts to teach his daughter how to dress modestly (Not a pretty sight). You can read the story here: http://dadshortshorts.com/



2.       Dad shoots his daughters laptop and posts the video on YouTube to teach her a lesson after she was disrespectful to him and her mother on her facebook page. (The really funny thing about this one is that she trash-talked her parents on facebook and thought they wouldn’t find out yet her dad is an IT expert!)



·         Immortalizing adorable and sometimes embarrassing family moments

I think that sometimes parents see the world through rose-colored glasses. There are those who see your embarrassing moments as ‘awww’ moments and they just have to share them with the world. And since we have so thoroughly educated them on the basics of smart-phone use so that they won’t be left behind with the times, we’ve transformed them into camera-happy paparazzi who can take photos at a moment’s notice and upload them on facebook or twitter; accompanied of course with a witty caption and a barrage of likes and comments from your uncles and aunties.

·         Finding long lost children in the blink of an eye

This one’s actually pretty cool. They've been so many stories about adopted kids who start a facebook page and share a photo containing the relevant information and then find their biological parents after about 48 hours.

·         Parental blogs

This one is basically for moms and Dads who start blogs documenting their children’s lives and giving out parenting and home-improving tips left, right and centre. And once the blogs does really well, they write a book and make some money! It’s a plan, right?

·         Parents who use slang

Every time my mother says ‘lol’ on facebook I do a double-take. I think it’s just something I’m not entirely accustomed to. But at least she actually knows what it means, there are parents out there using abbreviations in the worst possible way!


   But all in all I guess it’s really interesting to see what going on because as a friend of mine once said: The children of our generation will be the unluckiest of all time because they will have parents who know how to check browser history!

Ciao!!!

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