Much like vampires, things you post online live forever.
So, it makes sense that Sarah Michelle Gellar wants to slay any potential of her kids being haunted by the demons of their TikTok pasts.
The former “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” star recently told Yahoo that she and husband Freddie Prinze Jr. don’t allow their kids to have social media accounts and barely let them look at the platforms.
“Our rules are probably stricter than most. Our kids don’t have social media,” Gellar told the outlet. “They’re allowed to look sometimes when it’s our phones. Sometimes, our kids will be like, ‘You guys are the strictest household!’ But I say, ‘Yes, but everyone still wants to come here!’”
Gellar then said in order to drive home the idea of permanence online, she told her daughter Charlotte, 13, and son Rocky, 10, to think of kids publishing social media posts as getting a “Paw Patrol” tattoo on your face at age 5.
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“Because at that age, there’s nothing better than ‘Paw Patrol.’ And now, you’re 10 and [13], and you still have these tattoos on your face, and it’s not even who you are anymore,” Gellar said she explained to her kids. “That’s a very hard concept for young kids to grasp.”
Gellar is well aware of how a social media post could go south. The actor had to issue an apology in 2018 when she posted a series of photos of herself in lingerie on Instagram “as a reminder not to overeat” during Thanksgiving. Although Gellar said in her apology that she was trying to be “humorous,” many felt the post was promoting “diet culture,” “fat shaming” and could trigger people with disordered eating.
Here’s just hoping that’s not who Gellar is anymore.