[Mommy24]

Brown~ I think it is because of all the "horror" stories everyone hears about MySpace and the internet in general, so many freaks out there.

As to the original question from Oceans, My birth sons birth father has his pics on his MySpace, he is 17 and knows this and hasn't asked for them to be removed, and neither has his mom. For me, I am uncomfortable with it. I do agree that pics prior to TPR are the property of the birth parents and they should be able to do what they want with them (safely, minus identifying info) but I think permission? should be obtained to post them on a public site, Myspace, Flickr, Facebook, etc..

JMO and it could change, keep talking LOL!!

[agathaj]

I'm doing a late shift again so I'm online and I saw this thread...and my tired brain thought - what if my bteen posted pics of me on her public myspace and named me and said 'this is my bmother'!!! How would I feel? Does she have a right to do this if I don't have a right to put her photos on my myspace without her or amother's permission???

[Fran27]

I would never post pictures of my nieces or nephews on a public site either. So I guess it really doesn't change my opinion

[loveajax]

I am "old school," I know but I have never posted pix of DD on a public forum (or of my nieces and nephews, etc.). I think it is because in my job I have seen so many creeps. It makes me paranoid.

I wouldn't care if DD's birth mom posted pix of her (which of course she won't yet since DD is still a "secret") on a private/password protected forum.

[jjsmom3]

Funny that this should be brought up now. We recently had this issue come up. We do not like our kids faces to be posted on a public page. (bio or adopted) We recently had to ask J's fmom to change her page to private because she had his picture, name and general location posted on her public space. We were not happy.

We understand she wants her friends and family to be able to see him. We don't have a problem with that. We just take issue with ALL of his info being out there in cyber-space for anyone to see.

Now, we are the enemy. How dare we ask her to make it private?!? I guess this too shall pass.

[Stormster]

I never even forward pics of children via email without parent's permission and even then I never put their names. DS is on his birthmother's my space page but I asked her not to use his last name. She ended up not putting anything but the images....also of us with him, holding him. It was weird at first, she didn't ask but told me and I felt if there was no name it was ok. She is so proud of him and I don't blame her! He's adorable. It is one of the few things in her life that gives her so much joy now I wouldn't take it away from her but no way will I ever let her put his name in.

Re: pre TPR pics: two of my favorite pics are pre TPR. It makes me feel uncomfortable to think he wasn't "our son" and I was holding somebody else's son. Just being honest. Plus I don't think children "belong" to anyone. I was just holding E.!!!

[browneyes0707]

I get the no names thing. I know a lot of friends who have made their profiles private once they added their kids to their photos, and I understand that. But honestly if I'm going to put up a pic of my bridal party which included my minor nieces and nephews on my private/friends only myspace page, I'm not going to be blocking out their faces with bars or anything or asking for explicit permission from my SIL. It never even crossed my mind to do that.

Thinking about it, I did create a Kodak Easy Share album of my wedding and shared it with my address book (including the SIL's) and no one said anything. And even though you need a specific link that I have to send you, there is no stopping that link from being passed on to people I don't know.

Bottom line for me is that I think it's no big deal because my SIL's trust me enough to know that I'm not going to do anything disrespectful or inappropriate. And I think that's what it comes down to, trust and respect plain and simple. And the more I think about it, I would only ask my daughter's a-mom out of respect IF she gave me pictures. If say I was at a visit and I took my own pics of DD with my own camera, I don't think that I should ask permission to share them on a private website. (again, provided I was being responsible and respecting privacy) But again, it all comes down to respect. If it bothered her a-mom that much, I'd take them down, because it's kind of a silly battle to fight.

[Oceans]

Bottom line for me is that I think it's no big deal because my SIL's trust me enough to know that I'm not going to do anything disrespectful or inappropriate. And I think that's what it comes down to, trust and respect plain and simple.

Brown - I think you are onto something here. It is a matter of trust and respect (and of course personal preference as to whether or not you like pics on the Internet).

I don't think there's a great danger to post pics publically less identifying info. If you go to any blogspot page and start clicking "next page" about every other American blog out there is showing pics of young kids and details of their day. Identifying a child and then swooping into kidnap because of a blog has never happened that I'm aware of. I think it is more likely that (if that were to happen) it would be someone you are acquainted with OR at Wal-Mart, Safeway, etc...

Also, if you look at the IA boards, many have blogs showing pics of kids they have yet to adopt "officially". How do I feel about that... honestly, I never thought about it before TG's question now I'm not sure....

[mama_again]

I have to place my 2 cents in on this subject, because I have been struggling just this week with seeing some recently sent pictures on MS. It makes us uncomfortable as well, but how do we say noo to sending picture. I think for me now is to only send pics via mail and not text or email... I know they can be scanned, but it is not as easy to do that so I will have to refrain for while, and hopefully we can find the right words to not offend. It's a hard topic, but one to surely we have needed to address...
This makes me think about all the pics I have emailed, thanks for opening my eyes on this one stormster....

[aclee]

Originally Posted by thanksgivingmom

I do wonder....how many times when we see pictures posted here announcing the excitement of a new birth were those pictures possibly taken before TPR? Why should that be treated any differently? Interesting twist on an age old debate Oceans!

I do want to comment on this because I missed it before. When we were with M at the hospital, we asked before we took any pictures of Tyler, and we asked before we took any pictures of her as well. Then we asked if it was okay if we shared pictures with our family only. We said only of Tyler if that was what she wanted. She said she would love for us to e-mail everyone we knew a picture of Tyler and if we were proud to show him off, that made her happy. She said she didn't think anyone would "want" to see her. I told her she was beautiful and they might wonder some day where he got his sweet little face, and she smiled and said, Well you CAN show them whenever you want, I just don't think they will really care will they? If they can look at him instead?

Since I feel strongly about it, I did ask. I thought it was the right thing to do. I think it's an interesting question, and I would love to hear from some birth/first moms about it.

[thanksgivingmom]

If Cupcake's Mom has any pics of DD from those first few days (I really don't know if she does) she can do with them as she pleases - I suppose I would like to know if she has them just because they're probably much better quality than my two polaroids and I would love to see them

I just really have a personal attachment to the two photos I DO have and would like to be able to feel like I don't have to ask permission to show them....this topic has really brought up a lot of emotions for me with regards to negotiating emotions vs. legality.

Stormster, I completely understand what you mean in that E was just E and not "belonging" to someone else. I know that's not how I (and certainly not Oceans) intended it. The issue becomes that legality...emotionally of course he was your son...just like emotionally while I know Cupcake has another Mom, I can't separate from that emotion that she's my daughter. Which is what makes things like asking permission to share a picture of us together to my friends seem like such a strange thing to request. It's that struggle between emotions and what is legally true.

[Jenn4615]

My DD's first mom has pictures of her on her myspace. But, for her I think its really been something that has helped her heal. I am perfectly fine with it. I am glad she is so open with her friends and family with everything. There was a point when she did not want to deal with it... so I think in our situation its great. There is no identifying information or anything. It's nice to see pictures of DD mixed in with her Bio siblings (she has three others!! she is raising!!)

[SuzBerg]

Oceans - I've been pondering this question/topic (since I'm sick I'm even less able to formulate an intelligent response than usual so take this for what it's worth).

My situation is different than most of the previous posters, we have a closed adoption (I do have enough info - because the caseworker did not de-identyifing info in her files- to help Em search when she is older and ready). We adopted E at age 2.5, she was with her birthparents for 5 months and in foster care for the following 2 years. Her birthparents signed TPR when she was 1.5, so I feel it if they have pictures of her, they can do whatever they want with them. The pics belong to them.

If they did have them posted on a web-site I might like it because I (selfish me) would be able to see what she looked like the first year and a half of her life. I only have 4 pics (she saw a genetecist every 6 months and they took a picture, when we consulted with them before the adoption her nurse gave us copies of the pics) of her first 1.5 years. I do have some pics that a caseworker took that don't have any dates or names (I'm not even sure who some of the people are in the pics - I'm sure they are birthfamily members but I will not be able to tell her who they are) and a few her first foster mother put in a book (again no names or dates but at least we have some pictures).

So all that lengthy rambling to say that if pics were taken of my daughter (and this is just in our case not saying anyone else should feel this way) before TPR, I would feel the were her birthparents pics to do whatever they want with. I realize my situation is different from a lot of people but wanted to post my perspective on the situation. - Suz

[Stormster]

You know I totally hear you! But I was thinking today WHY some Aparents (I am not one of them) are not comfortable having their child's pic on myspace....

And I would HOPE it has more to do with just wanting to keep the child safe from possible predators than feeling the birthmother had no RIGHT to share the photos.

I can only imagine how precious those pre TPR days were for you. But the reality is the child is a living breathing person now who exists in real time and it is his parents obligation to keep him safe and it really isn't safe to display pics in a public forum. I even took DS's pics down here!

Maybe I'm naive and oversimplifying things. In theory I agree with you. I just think it should be a PRIVATE password protected forum. That is no different than showing your friends your personal pics from those first days and nobody rational would argue that point!

I feel like I missed something here though....I'm tired i don't think that made sense I'm sorry. Maybe someone as tired as I am will make sense of it.