Hezah, 26

This isn’t the first time I have been a listening ear to this complaint. Year after year the volume of parents on Facebook rises at exponential rates. Surprisingly, middle aged women are the most active participants on a site spawned from a college student’s brain. Baby boomers are starting to recognize the importance in social media (good for you!), and many have even figured out that the best way to make contact their adult child is through Facebook.

We might not return a call from our parents for days, but you can sure as hell bet we’ll reply to a Facebook post or message immediately. In a lot of ways, I see this improving the relationship and communication between twenty-somethings and their parents, providing a few more channels to connect. It’s kind of nice to see them reaching out, making an effort to learn to a language so foreign to them. Still, depending on the nature of your own parental relationship history, this could easily turn into a, “I told you not to go into my room!” situation.

Facebook has the potential to either move your parent/adult child relationship forward or set you ten years back to the dark teen-ages. My parents, for better or worse, chose a laissez faire parenting approach that has saved me many embarrassing conversations erupting from parental intrusion. Both of my parents remain skeptical of social networking sites, having been raised to not share private information with anyone. However, my mother and father read this blog regularly; probably to remind themselves that they paid way too much for my degree in creative writing. As such, both of my parents have called me on separate occasions to yell at me about how I live my life…based on what they read on my blog. Gary and Debbie, I know you are reading this. I love you both very much, but stop judging me based on these entries and seriously, stop reading into this sentence.

I think it’s great that so many baby boomers have adopted social media with incredible ease and curiosity. Unfortunately, much of their inquisitive behavior on Facebook is usually directed at their adult children’s profiles, activities, and essentially lives. Our parents’ generation doesn’t necessarily understand the subtle nuances regarding boundaries between our on and offline lives. An unspoken etiquette for online behavior and interaction has arisen, but I don’t think they’ve gotten the memo.

If you, or someone you know, has been affected by intrusive parenting on Facebook, please read on. These ten talking points can be used as an injunction on a wide range of parents, and can be a useful tool in preventing any twenty something from teen angst flashbacks.

1. Sometimes, Facebook is not an entirely accurate portrayal of my life. I know the last few photos of me were from parties where I wasn’t wearing very much clothing. I understand that I had a beer in my hand in every photo. I wasn’t that drunk; I just blinked when flash went off. No, this isn’t the only thing I do in my free time, but surprisingly there isn’t anyone with a camera nearby when I am eating cheese on my couch, doing my laundry, or when I am sitting at my desk during work hours.
2. Being connected with someone on Facebook is a privilege. Just because you can see the activity on my profile, does not give you the right to use this information against them offline. Mom, I understand that a male person shared a link on my wall, but that doesn’t mean we are dating.
3.  I am an adult.
4.  Please stop interacting with my friends online. I understand that they have been major characters in many stories told to you, but that doesn’t mean you know them. If you’ve never met in person, it’s creepy and embarrassing.
5. Thank you for observing that I seem to predominantly check into bars and concerts. If you’ll notice, I have checked in with several other friends; I didn’t go alone. I’m fairly certain no one really cares about my stops into CVS, Trader Joe’s, my office, the lady doctor, or even my own home. This is what we call a filter, Mom.
6. Stop typing in all caps. I feel like you’re yelling at me.
7. Please try and refrain from leaving public messages on my wall that are better suited for many other communication channels such as email, text, or voicemail. If you really must use Facebook, a private message will suffice. My entire network doesn’t need to know I accidentally left some pieces of laundry last time I was home.
8. On that note, you don’t need to include a signature on your messages. I can clearly determine by both your name and profile picture that the memo was written by you.
9. You cannot compare me to my friends, siblings, and cousins based on the information you see on Facebook. I understand that my cousin just got a killer promotion, and is probably making twice as much money as me now. I’m not there yet, and it might take me a little while to get there. Cool your jets.
10. For the love of God, I’m an adult now!

As an aside to any parents reading this, your children love you very much. Please try to respect them as individuals and adults, both on and offline. We’ll try and do the same for you, except when we ask for money.