ethics of blogging and parenting are complex
Welcome back SUS and happy belated new year! FFF here. Thanks for your sharing your thoughts and questions in your last post on ethics and blogging and relational identity. You’ve offered me, and others I expect, a lot to think about.
Coincidentally, I too have been thinking about the complexities and realities of speaking about our children, our struggles with parenting and balancing our personal privacy, the privacy of our children, and the need to find support as parents. I realize that as our children mature and age into and through adulthood, the issues may become more serious, complicated, and socially stigmatized, which also adds to the challenge of finding ways to continue to parent while also finding support in the practices of parenting that we choose to engage in, not engage in, or disengage from.
I also expect that there is a difference in the decision and outcome of sharing stories orally and sharing stories through the written word. Verbally confiding in another person, asking for advice / guidance, or sharing knowledge based on lived experiences often feels less risky than doing so in a written format (by letter, blog, text), as the written form is more likely to become a permanent record, which can be used to judge the people involved and the decisions made.
It seems to me that the ethics involved in the practice of parenting and blogging, as in all elements of life, are inherently connected with interpersonal relationships and that our relational identity has a role to play in how we understand ourselves, others, and how we are to proceed in those familial relational relationships and relationships outside of our families, however we define them. I wonder if your question about what is good tends to be about relational pragmatism, and not abstractions about what is right, because we are social beings interconnected with other humans and that there is a relational identity that needs to be considered in most circumstances, which ensures the complexity and messiness of what is good (Carol Gilligan's work comes to mind here).
I look forward to more discussion around the ethics of blogging and parenting.
Coincidentally, I too have been thinking about the complexities and realities of speaking about our children, our struggles with parenting and balancing our personal privacy, the privacy of our children, and the need to find support as parents. I realize that as our children mature and age into and through adulthood, the issues may become more serious, complicated, and socially stigmatized, which also adds to the challenge of finding ways to continue to parent while also finding support in the practices of parenting that we choose to engage in, not engage in, or disengage from.
I also expect that there is a difference in the decision and outcome of sharing stories orally and sharing stories through the written word. Verbally confiding in another person, asking for advice / guidance, or sharing knowledge based on lived experiences often feels less risky than doing so in a written format (by letter, blog, text), as the written form is more likely to become a permanent record, which can be used to judge the people involved and the decisions made.
It seems to me that the ethics involved in the practice of parenting and blogging, as in all elements of life, are inherently connected with interpersonal relationships and that our relational identity has a role to play in how we understand ourselves, others, and how we are to proceed in those familial relational relationships and relationships outside of our families, however we define them. I wonder if your question about what is good tends to be about relational pragmatism, and not abstractions about what is right, because we are social beings interconnected with other humans and that there is a relational identity that needs to be considered in most circumstances, which ensures the complexity and messiness of what is good (Carol Gilligan's work comes to mind here).
I look forward to more discussion around the ethics of blogging and parenting.
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