Facebook joker slammed as “weirdo” by parents after using photo of their child

Would you take a photo of someone else’s child, claiming them to be your own, for the purpose of illustrating a joke?

That has been the hot question this week after Facebook user El Prive uploaded a post to his social media account. The post was three photos depicting a very not-so-impressed child posing in what appears to be a studio. The post had the following caption attributed to it –

Y’all pray for my son , nothing wrong with him but I ate his pop tart before his class picture and he said he never smiling again

The post went instantly viral, and at the time of writing has accumulated well over 350,000 shares.

But the boy in the photo wasn’t the son of EL Prive. And it wasn’t long before his post reached the attention of two users claiming to be the boy’s actual parents. And they were not happy.

It appears that the boy’s daycare center photos, taken last year, were posted by a family member without any privacy settings applied. From there, his photos went viral, and became the subject of many online memes. That’s when they were picked up by EL Prive, who posted the above joke.

But according to the boy’s mother, identified on Facebook as LaShunta, claiming the boy is your own son is one joke too far.

So Kari’s school pics from last year has went viral. Nothing we can do about that part…it is what it is. There are a lot of posts/memes going around about him, and I must admit, some are hilarious. But it still doesn’t sit well with me that he’s being posted world wide. But like I said, it’s out there now and we can’t stop it. However, if you happen to see a post where someone is claiming him as there child, that is not funny…I don’t care if it is just a joke. Don’t be out here trying to use our son for likes or money. That’s lame and so disrespectful. Please, if yall continue to see people claiming him, claiming the pic as there’s, creating GoFundMe accounts and making money from my baby pics, please report it and let us know. Thanks!

The boy’s father also posted –

What type of weirdo claims somebody else son?
If yall see any go fund me accounts @ me or report.

EL Prive had also included a request to CashApp, an app that allows users to transfer money using a mobile phone.

For what it’s worth, EL Prive later admitted that his CashApp request raised a little over $20 which would be donated to a homeless shelter. He also later edited his original post to confirm it was a joke and that the boy in the photo was his “Internet son”.

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But the damage may have already been done. In two subsequent posts, EL Prive asks Facebook users to stop calling his workplace and complaining, and the next post claimed he had been fired from his job thanks to complaints. True or not? We don’t know.

Either way, we can learn three important lessons from this weird debacle.

– If you choose to upload photos of your children to social media, understand how privacy settings work, and make sure those photos use them.

– Think twice before taking photos of other people’s children, posting them yourself and claim them to be your own. Even if it is just for a joke.

– And also think twice before listing your workplace on your social media account. One moment of poor judgement, one ill-advised or imprudent like, share, comment or post could land your professional life in trouble, as countless other users can attest.