So, what do people post about on their social media that is not at all offensive/hurtful to anyone? Weather? (actually, I’ve seen arguments break out over weather reports too, lol…ugh, humans! 
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Funny you ask…good timing as I was just scrolling through facebook and one of my facebook friends posted this today:
https://waitbutwhy.com/2013/07/7-ways-to-be-insufferable-on-facebook.html
“most schools are encouraging posting pictures with their acceptance swag and hash-tagging all over the place”
Right, though that’s students rather than parents. Also, the idea is that the student is going to enroll, not drop that school like a hot potato when Georgetown comes through. Schools do not want to be perceived as backups.
That Wait But Why article is fantastic. I am looking in the mirror and so should a lot of people upthread, imo.
To me, as long as people post about themselves, not about others, nothing is offensive.
It’s their lives, their posts, their accounts.
If I felt offended whenever someone says/posts/writes something good for/about him/herself, I’d feel offended all day all night long. Don’t have time/energy for that.
I thought the main function of social media is for boasting/bragging lol. Seeing quite a bit even on CC, an almost anonymous site. Guess it is human nature.
Quit fb two years ago.
I have never been offended by a bragging post. I have, under certain circumstances, thought that the poster didn’t show good judgment about how s/he was coming across. (For example, the posting of a GPA.)
Wait, what?! Social media is mostly about image crafting? No? You don’t say?
I think it’s fine to share good news. Life isn’t fair, not everyone gets into their first choice school, not everyone chooses to go to an elite school and none of that matters. Wherever they go it’s an accomplishment and if you can’t share a major event, with your family and friends, then what is the point of using social media?
Don’t people understand that very few people really care about your kids acceptances? Sure, some family etc will care, but is simply unnecessarily bragging. Social media makes people feel like crap.
^people don’t post to make others feel like crap (for the most part). I know a lot of parents like myself post their kids’ stuff mostly as an online journal. I don’t keep scrapbooks nor do I keep photo albums for the last several years so looking at my albums on FB is my way of reminiscing and to share with my family and friends who don’t see us on a regular basis.
If people go on social media and it makes them feel bad then they should seriously consider deactivating their account or just unfollow all the people who post about their kids because people will continue to post about their lives
@doschicos very good article
I really don’t understand this line of reasoning. I’ll post a picture from Disneyworld knowing full well that some FB will never afford it but if it bothers them they can block me.
I posted a prom picture knowing full well that we have a friend whose daughter has Down’s.
I’ve posted a picture of the creek in my yard flooding after torrential rain. Many people don’t have yards.
I posted when my wife was 5 years cancer free.
I assume that my friends share my joy. If the don’t then they are not my friends.
@DG I care about all of my friends and their children. I enjoy hearing about their lives, including what colleges they get into.
If you want to characterize this as a discussion about whether it’s appropriate, in general, to post on social media about good things that happened to you or your kid, in my opinion, you’re missing the point. And I’m guessing you probably understand that at some level.
It’s a matter of common courtesy that if you and your friends are all competing for something not all of you can have, and everyone is working hard and competing fairly, you don’t rub their faces in it if you’re successful and they’re not. It’s called good sportsmanship, or grace, or being raised properly. You should know it when you see it.
Everything depends on context. If you’re the only kid at your school who’s applied to an Ivy in years and you get into Harvard, or you’re recruited for the football team at Stanford, you didn’t snatch something away from your classmates and friends that they all competed hard for and theoretically deserved about as much as you. You can probably do a victory lap, and everyone’s probably cheering for you.
On the other hand, if you’re one of a group of 10 or 20 high-achieving friends, all of whom have a legitimate shot at Princeton and want to go there, and you know Princeton’s going to admit one or two from your high school, and you’re the one who’s fortunate enough to get in, for reasons you’ll never know ( or maybe you had a connection), do you post a triumphant photo on social media (where your friends are all your followers) captioned “So unbelievably thrilled to be Princeton 2022!!!” and go to school the next day in Princeton gear? Do your parents do something similar? I hope you at least think twice about it.
I think you have to ask yourself: “would I do it to all these people’s faces in the real world?” If not, then I think you should stop pretending that it’s just a normal celebration of a life event and anyone who doesn’t like it should just unfriend you.
"I think you have to ask yourself: “would I do it to all these people’s faces in the real world?”
Problem is, some of them would!
I’m not a big social media person and neither is my D18- within a few minutes of D18’s phone call to her best friend to tell her she got in to her #1, her best friend posted how happy she was for my D18 and tagged me on it.
My D18 has 600 kids in her graduating class, but about 85 in her IB group- within a few minutes they all knew about everyone’s Ivy results and who got in to Duke and who got deferred. They all group chat- so it’s pretty common knowledge. With that- they certainly are more forthcoming with rejections/deferrals, usually someone else talks about a friend’s acceptance.
DeepBlue, substitute your scenario with any D1 headcount sport. It’s getting tweeted and many kids are vying for that full ride D1 football or basketball ride. Do kids get hurt? Of course they do, but the kids that receive the acceptance/scholarship are gonna post on some form of SM (parents too in a lot of cases) and it’s not distasteful. That’s life and nowadays with SM that’s the norm. The number of D1 athletes I I know who get recruited to pac12 sports are very excited and deservedly so. One of them even took a spot that I would have loved for my son to have received but they deserved it more than him. In my neck of the woods, most high stat academic athletes desire Pac 12 over Ivy League schools, so it’s a big deal when one of them gets a full ride (even partial scholarship for equivalency sports) and not uncommon nor distasteful to post their news.
@CALSmom, I generally agree. I specifically said:
The reasons I think it’s OK in this example are: it’s more strictly meritocratic (you get recruited if you have the necessary skills, if not, you don’t) and therefore there are fewer hard feelings (as you noted in your own case), it’s actually newsworthy (in that specialized publications follow this stuff and will report on it), it’s a point of pride for the entire school, and, as you say, posting this kind of thing is the norm. That’s different from celebrating getting the one spot Princeton allocates year in and year out to your high school when your 10 friends who didn’t get it were just as qualified.
error, sorry!