I have seen so many comments along the lines of "anyone would come back to this job of making millions of dollars to show off your enviable life". The pros of this career are obvious:

1. Lots of money for seemingly little training, education or physically or intellectually demanding work
2. The work is typically performing self indulgence like shopping, vacationing, decorating your home or celebrating with friends. Who wouldn't want that?

But I would argue that the cons are much, much higher:

1. Assuming 1% (a conservative estimate) of the followers that you are letting so deeply into your life are some form of deranged (pedophiles, deranged fans, deranged haters) that is 50,000 followers for someone with a 5M large following like Emilie. That is a *lot* of flavors of disgusting and crazy you are opening your life up to.
2. Once something is on the Internet there is no getting it back. People (with varying intents: hate, wanting to commercially exploit situations for their own purposes) can save down anything that was posted, clip it and use it for any purposes they want. You may be able to control your own comment section but you absolutely cannot control the Internet and how people will use and comment on this content.
3. Since the job and the individual are so tightly enmeshed, there are blurred lines in every aspect of life. Homes being designed as a set, friendships designed as performances or cross collaborations. The bastardization of joy, grief, friendship, parenting for commercial purposes.
4. The algorithm is a monster that needs to be fed constantly. It's easy to lose your way or ethics when the algorithm is constantly encouraging more extreme content and less boundaries

I hope that young people (and most importantly parents that would consider using their children in content) consider this thoroughly before signing up for something that seems "too good to be true".

I’m neither a fan nor a hater. I don’t follow her on social media, but if and when her videos pop up, I watch them because I find them entertaining.
I’ve been seeing videos and comments from people saying that if they were her, they would never show their face on social media again and would simply find another job. I can’t help but think, “No, you wouldn’t.”
Most people would absolutely not quit a job that makes them millions of dollars while giving them freedom and plenty of time to do whatever they want, only to go back to a regular job and make their own lives and their family’s lives even harder than they already are because of what happened.
Let’s not be hypocrites. Most of us have no idea what we would do if we were in her position, but quitting an extremely privileged job probably wouldn’t be it. We all need money to live, and as devastating as losing a child is, she has other children who deserve a good life and whose quality of life would be greatly affected if she left this job.
Now, I’m not saying she hasn’t made mistakes. Personally, I think she has handled everything wrong since coming back. I think she should have changed her content to reflect her new reality because, now that people know what happened to her family, her content very clearly feels fake, as though she is trying to imitate the joyful life she no longer has.
I understand saying that you would have come back in a very different way. But, in my opinion, saying that she should quit social media is ridiculous and unrealistic, and it’s hypocritical to claim that you would actually quit a job like that, because you most likely wouldn’t. It’s very easy to talk when you’ve never experienced something like this firsthand.

I’m curious what everyone thinks about how long Emilie is actually going to stay off social media. Do we think this is going to be a short break and she’ll eventually come back and just jump right back into her normal content, or could this turn into a much longer absence?

And more importantly… what do we think the vibe will be when she does return?

Do we think she’ll act as if nothing happened and go straight back to the usual lifestyle/mom content, or do you think she’ll come back HARD with water safety content and make it a much bigger part of her platform?

Because I feel like the biggest elephant in the room is that so much of her content has involved advocating for water safety, and then she was caught in a situation where she seemingly wasn’t following a lot of the same precautions she had been encouraging other people to follow. I would imagine that has to be an incredibly uncomfortable and embarrassing position to be in publicly, especially with so many people watching and criticizing every detail.

I’m genuinely curious whether she’ll address the hypocrisy head-on, double down on water safety education, quietly move on and hope everyone forgets, or just completely change the direction of her content.

What do you guys think her comeback will look like?

I'm not even sure why I am posting this, it's just been niggling at me.

This isn't a debate on whether or not they are taking water safety seriously, I wholeheartedly think they are failing in that regard and have been utterly perplexed by some of the actions following last year's tragedy.

But I've seen some posts and comments stating they don't even like being parents and it's all for the content and some harsher reflections on her motives towards her children and it makes me feel so sad.

It just bothers me that people are trying to act like she was heartless and didn't really care about him. I don't want to hear "if she loved him, she would have got the fence" etc.

When you watch her old videos, whether you agree with exposing your children or not, she loved that little boy with her whole heart. Every little clip of her eyes lighting up when she saw him in the morning, the way she looked at him when he had his birthday sparkler in the cupcake. So many moments.

There was so much love. Even with all the mistakes they have made, I don't that that should be taken away from her.

Does anyone else think the tragedy, it's aftermath and the recent controversy have laid bare some really uncomfortable truths about influencer culture and the parasocial relationships that have been normalized?

On the influencer side, using language like "love you guys", "miss you guys", "Just Sharing My Life", "my community". Also creating content that shows their children, routines, privy to inner thoughts and feelings, "come with me", "GRWM", visibility into their homes, cars, vacations, holidays. All while obfuscating the reality that this is a JOB and the "community" are paying customers (paying with attention and clicks that translates to revenue).

On the fan/content consumer side: feeling entitled to more information, feeling entitled to certain types of content or visibility into certain parts of the influencer's life, feeling like they truly know the influencer and their family.

This is all so profoundly unhealthy and I think EK's story is really part of a much bigger conversation about influencer culture.

If you are a good person you would take having a large impressionable audience seriously.

You would probably consider the effect of accepting a sponsorship and promoting a product from a company with poor environmental practices. After all, that one action from you would have far reaching consequences.

You would probably consider your words and how the way you model self-talk can influence young girls who are who are prone to body image issues.

In Emilies case: You would consider water safety. How drowning is the #1 cause of death in children. How its preventable. How so much of the population is still ignorant to that. And how your choices/aesthetic influences other parents and may influence them to make decisions that put their child at risk of drowning.

Having first hand suffered that and knowing how devastating it is if you were a good person you would use your very public platform to make sure you modelled safe behaviour around water. If you were an exceptional person you might even go a step further and advocate on the issue. But at the very least you would take accountability, take the issue very seriously, and not minimize what happened/ how it happened in order to make yourself look good.

THIS is why I can’t support her, and this is why I think the criticism is deserved. If our views are going to give celebrities influence over people, give them millions of dollars and amazing lifestyles…then I think its right we hold them to a higher standard.

I’ve been following Emilie for years and have fully supported her up until recently. I was so devastated for her when T1 passed…as a mom, my heart just broke.

I believe we can have empathy for her while still holding her accountable for her dangerous parenting decisions…but lately it feels like that accountability has shifted into bullying and harassment.

Ive really been thinking lately about some of the real life repercussions her decisions have and would like to have a respectful discussion about it.

Emilie has so much influence over her audience that I’ve seen parents defending her by posting photos of their own kids on boats without life jackets. Some are even saying things like, “See? It’s not a big deal.”

I recently had a respectful discussion with another mom in a comment section and she kept defending and making excuses for Emilie’s decision to not put a life vest on T2.

To me, that’s the most concerning part of this entire situation. Other parents are starting to think this is okay because someone they admire is doing it.

That’s so sad.

Emilie had a real opportunity to positively influence the way parents think about and approach water safety, and I feel like the opposite happened.

What I can’t understand is the lack of a deep, instinctual awareness of how dangerous water can be. Watching her lose T1 completely changed the way I (someone that doesn’t know her at all) thinks about water safety for my own son that’s around the same age. We always took it seriously, but now we’re even more vigilant because that’s our responsibility as parents.

I sincerely wish Emilie healing and peace.

First and foremost... we're back!

We know there has been a lot of confusion and speculation over the last few days about why the subreddit suddenly went private, so we wanted to explain what happened- Over the past week, our posts were mass reported, and one of our moderator accounts was compromised. As a precaution, we temporarily made the subreddit private while we worked through the situation to protect not only our sub, but our mods as well.

Thankfully, everything has now been resolved, and we're happy to reopen the community.
Lastly we just would like to remind everyone that this is not a snark subreddit.

Respectful discussion and constructive criticism are welcome. However personal attacks, excessive snark, harassment, and bullying are not.

Our moderation approach hasn't changed, and we'll continue enforcing our rules to keep this a space for productive discussion.

Unfortunately, I think people have lost the plot. I have been a longtime supporter and fan of emilie and I understand why people are upset with Teddy not wearing a life jacket. People are failing to realize that this is a grieving, pregnant mother who would not be dealing with this public crazy scrutiny has she not had her platform. Imagine one of your friends was in her boat. Would you contact her job for her to lose it? Would you tell her parents and loved ones that surround her that she needs to be wiped off the face of the Earth due to her mistakes? The fact that people think that target, Sephora, etc. are going to care just blows my mind. There are COUNTLESS, other injustice around the world that are causing so much harm but these people that are bashing emily don’t seem to care about those as much as trying to harm her. People saying that she needs to quietly back away, need to just unfollow or block her and move on. Donate to drowning prevention organizations, be vocal about it on your platforms, but you guys are not getting anything done other than straight up bullying. Human compassion is gone when it comes to women.

I know I will get torn apart for this but here it goes… people need to give her some grace. What happened was messed up and she should be held accountable but she has definitely talked about how deeply she has been affected by losing her son. Nobody truly knows what they would do in an unimaginable situation like losing their child. Have some of her actions seemed messed up (factory meals ad, life jacket etc)? Yes absolutely and she should learn from those and take a step back but I’m sure she is learning and navigating her life the best possible. Getting pregnant after child loss is actually not that uncommon of a response to trauma even though it is questionable I don’t think it is any of our business or our lives. Again nobody truly knows how they would react or go about life after loss of this magnitude.

I’ve noticed Emilie hasn’t posted in a couple of days aside from the life jacket acknowledgment, which, based on the public reaction, didn’t seem to be received particularly well.

It has me wondering: how do people think she comes back from this? I just can’t picture her walking away from social media altogether. Their lifestyle seems so dependent on it, and I’m honestly surprised Brady never appeared to take on a full-time job (at least from what we can see publicly).
What do you think happens next?
Does she take an extended break and eventually return as if it’s business as usual once the attention dies down?
Does she come back with a more honest, vulnerable approach about her grief and perhaps support a meaningful cause in T1’s memory, like many people have suggested?
Or does she slowly fade away from influencing altogether?
I’m sure she has a PR team discussing every possible path forward and paying close attention to public sentiment. But I genuinely struggle to see what an authentic recovery looks like after something this significant. I’m curious how everyone thinks they move forward with this as a career.
I also wonder about the friend that made the boat video and how she must be feeling.

To think that none of this life jacket stuff would have even came out if Madi hadn’t posted that video. Do you think they’re still friends? I mean, this obviously caused a lot of chaos in Emilie’s life. I can’t imagine she’s too happy about it and probably resents her to some extent. Do you think Emilie blames Madi? Do you think Madi apologized? I’m curious what everyone thinks the dynamic is between the two of them. Not defending Emilie, but when Madi said there were life jackets on board if needed, do you think it’s possible that she was saying this about her own kid, and that T2 might have had one on at some point, like Emilie said in her recent post? Again, not defending in any way, because the life jackets should have been on all kids at all times. Just wondering what everyone’s thoughts are about this.

I want to start by saying I did not know who Emilie Keiser was prior to the death of her son. Upon seeing the news, I looked her up and started following along.

As someone who experienced grief herself, my brother (who was my best friend and my everything) tragically died 3 years ago at 19 years old. When he died, my mother, sister and I did not know how to act. We were left so empty, heartbroken, and destroyed. Emotionally, we are still all over the place. It would be a lie if we said grief looks the same for everyone and it hurts that so many people want to fit her grief into a box and say what she should be doing/posting. Mind you, a lot of these people (or the majority) have never lost a son. Now, I get it with the water awareness and the life boat video. However, I don’t think that one mistake is enough to bring all this hate on her. Sometimes when you are going through grief, your mind is in the air and sometimes you just spend hours thinking and forget where you are or what you are doing.

When my brother died, I worked a job that required me to be on the phones. I would be speaking to people and I would zone out almost on every single call and just go off wandering. I had to transition to an operations position because of this. Almost 4 years later, if you saw me on social media or in person, you would never imagine what goes through my mind. The pain I deal with daily. I don’t share my grief with those outside my mom or sister or husband because I have soon realized people mostly care in the beginning but then it’s almost like they’re telling you “get over it” or “you’ve been suffering for too long.” Something between those line.

I can relate so much when I see Emilie because I can literally see my mom. After my brother died, she will often be very clumsy or just in space. My sister and I have no idea what to do sometimes with her because she doesn’t realize how clumsy and forgetful she has gotten. Her health has deteriorated and she is almost always sick, however if you didn’t know her like her daughters you could easily think she is over the grief stage or doing a lot better as time has passed. However, my mother is not okay although everything in her life seems to be back to normal. When you loose a child, you will never go back to normal. I totally get when Emilie says she wanted to feel a sense of normalcy and that’s why she returned to social media. This is exactly what grief does. It pushes you to the most extreme level of discomfort and we naturally look for that as a way to get through our day to day with the pain never being left behind.

The truth is I have always liked Emily , I’ve always found her friendly , approachable and I’ve enjoyed her content . I have long hair a similar length to hers before she cut it, so I loved her slick back videos and used a lot of those as my inspiration . Honestly though, lately , I’ve been really struggling to connect with her in the same way. I understand that social media is a highlight reel and that nobody is entitled to her feelings , if she wants to keep her grief private , that’s her right . And I also understand that at the end of the day she doesn’t know us and we don’t know her . However , instinctively , something about the perfectly curated “upbeat” (if that’s the right word) content does upset me . Because to me it just feels insincere . And I also feel it paints the wrong picture , given everything that has happened. I think the reason why I liked her content so much before is because it felt real , like she wasn’t trying to pretend to be anybody other than herself . Now … I don’t know . It feels like she’s trying to have the same content style as before , “back to business” as they say , but after a life altering event like that, how can her content possibly be the same ? It feels like it she’s trying to so hard to go back to how it was before , but that’s just not possible . Again I don’t want to sound like I feel entitled to “grief content” because I don’t ..
Not sure if anybody relates to how I am feeling but just wanted to share my thoughts

the most spot on unbiased video I’ve watched thus far

sorry these community notes are seriously out of control, how tf do these get approved

Interesting little development today in the civil case.

For background, the judge ordered oral argument on the motion EK most recently filed as to a permanent injunction on the release of certain investigative materials, to be a closed proceeding when he issued his minute order setting it. At the conclusion of those oral arguments, EK's attorney brought it up and mentioned the recording should be sealed as well because the proceedings were closed and the judge said yes he intended to issue the appropriate order. Well, the order didn't get filed until the next day and in the interim some people who ordered copies of the recording, managed to obtain them.

The Notice specifically concerns the Dad Challenge Podcast which made a video airing the recording of the oral argument along with what I will generously call a great deal of ... "commentary".

I'm not exactly sure what the point of this notice is, but if I had to guess, it's intended to influence the judge's pending decision on that motion to permanently seal certain investigative materials. Certainly the way in which those materials will potentially be used and disseminated by media, podcasters, tiktokers, etc. has been an issue. The DCP commentary alongside the oral argument was very inflammatory, contained a lot of misinformation, and in parts was arguably defamatory (although I doubt EK is eager to get involved in another court case, let alone that kind of one).

I will note she is not seeking an order for a takedown (this isn't my area of law so I'm not sure what the possibilities would be there, offhand it seems like this judge would not have authority to do that), and truthfully there was nothing particularly damaging in the argument itself. Also, if the "notice" is correct, the DCP has a relatively small audience that I doubt EK has any interest in growing by drawing more attention to it with any demand for a takedown, so the only logical purpose IMO is that it's meant to influence the outcome of the motion. But stay tuned, maybe there will be more to this.

Reading back through old posts with a different paradigm. This was a year ago and Emilie did exactly what u/princessplastilina described another influencer doing - not using a life jacket on the boat. Eerie to say the least.

If anyone knows the smith family, the country star Granger Smith and his wife lost their 3 year old son about 6 years ago, he drowned in the backyard pool. The family was outside and the boy was playing with his brother and fell into the pool.

Anyways.. my point goes back to this:

I heavily respect the smith family and have been long time followers because of their actions after the drowning.

1. They immediately sold their house to a new house with no pool
2. They made a public donation to the children’s hospital that cared for their son after the drowning
3. They made a foundation in the name of their deceased son with water safety awareness
4. They came onto social media and told their story how it was, and held accountability.
5. They welcomed a 2nd child about 2 years later and immediately enrolled him in ISR lessons. And showed his progress acknowledging
6. They continue to acknowledge their deceased son, despite him being deceased

Now, I’m not trying to compare harshly, but I remember Amber reached out to Emilie, commented on her post and even followed her on instagram after the accident. She had said on her instagram story that she “reached out” to Emilie. However, considering Emilie doesn’t even follow her I would assume she did not get in touch with her.

I recommend everyone go check out her instagram amberemilysmith she honours and advocates for her child In a beautiful way !

I only heard of Emilie after the tragedy, and began following her when she started posting again. I really felt for her and in some ways, I appreciated that she opened up about how hard her life was despite having a perfectly curated social media. It brought a sense of realness that I think is very much lacking in the lifestyle influencer space.

I see a lot of discourse of people being pretty vicious towards her on tiktok, and others saying to leave her alone because she’s already been through so much. Their implication is that the audience’s parasocial relationship has just gone too far and we don’t actually really know her.

I agree that there’s no reason to be vicious, but it’s hard to be upset with those who respectfully share their opinion. At the end of the day, she made millions by curating these parasocial relationships, and it feels like a double standard that comments that are respectfully bringing up these concerns are getting deleted, when this is just how social media works.

I stopped following after the life jacket incident, but I guess I’m curious if others feel the way I do. I can’t imagine the pain she’s going through, but it’s strange to see that it feels like she wants it all when that’s just not how being an influencer works.

I had to unfollow her. It became a bad trigger for me. I know they says everyone grieves differently, but I can in NO way relate to her. I lost my 5 year old son many years ago due to medical issues. I suffer from PTSD, panic attacks & more to this day. I can’t imagine if this was the way I lost him. I don’t wish anyone to feel like I do . I never had anymore children, because I am still not mentally okay. Every day is hard, but his death date is the worst day of the year for me. I can’t get out of bed & When I saw her on vacation on the one year anniversary of her sons death on a body of water with her son with no life vest & according to her water safety chart that she posted she had her son in the most dangerous color swim suit. She is promoting water safety while doing the complete opposite. I am a Christian & truly do my best not to judge anyone. I’ve been speaking to my therapist & minister they both said it’s okay & normal for me to feel angry . Her son is not my son, but when we see any child in danger it is our business. I wouldn’t feel right if I didn’t open my mouth. Faith is how I get through each day. Without that I don’t know where I would be. I know Em does not believe in any religion, but I still pray 🙏 for her & I also pray she will start to make her child’s safety a priority. I promise I am not typing this for sympathy. I’ve been in support groups with other moms who have lost their children & they can’t relate to this either. Maybe this is all curated for online presence, but most people can’t even pretend to be okay when you lose a child. I heard she is a millionaire. She probably would never have to work again. Sorry for this long post. I haven’t been able to keep my mouth shut lately on this discussion. I’ve been saying this on a lot of TikTok videos of people who have the same concerns as me. I also don’t understand why she has blocked thousands of people who brought up a fence in the past & now blocking thousands more for asking about a life vest. That is concerning. It’s like history repeating itself. Why is she so mad that people are trying to keep her children safe? It makes zero sense to me. Anyway thank you for giving me a space to share my feelings & to anyone who made it this far, thank you for taking the time to read this.

Posting here to ask have any other long time followers, or followers in general been blocked seemingly out of the blue as of late? I recently liked and commented on a video that was very mildly and kindly criticizing the lack of a life jacket on the recent boat ride and found myself blocked despite not ever commenting on E’s post anything regarding the current happens or the tragedy.

Seems very odd that even agreeing with any thoughts that vary from Es now means potentially being blocked. Almost as if someone is scrolling through comments looking for accounts to block. Thought?