Are Their Consequences for Posting about Your Children On Social Media?

We exist in a culture that encourages freedom of speech. We now use social media to convey every thought with little time for reflection before pressing send. The experience of Covid has particularly given rise to a plethora of social media posts on both sides of the vaccination argument, for or against vaccination.

How does a parent’s freedom of speech get impacted when posting about his/her children?

While still in the middle of mask requirements during Covid, there was a case – Moore v Moore, 2022 ONSC 2378, the judge analyzed the social media posts of the father in a determination of the child’s best interests. The father in this case had filmed walking his child through a store without a mask in a demonstration of his own opinions and then posted the video on social media. The father’s actions and the nature of his post had the judge conclude that he had “cast aside” the best interests of the child and that he had a clear lack of appreciation as to how his actions could impact his child. The judge determined that the father’s actions had demonstrated he could not make decisions in the best interests of the child so the mother in this case was awarded final decision making for the child.

Please remember that your actions on social media can have implications for other areas in your life and can be brought in to court when dealing with the best interests of your children.

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