This this is why Facebook parents don’t party with their kids.

As my wife and I near our fourth anniversary and I near thirty, the question about children and whether or not we’ll be creating them has come up quite often. We tend to tell people that while we do like children, we just aren’t quite ready for them. That statement, unfortunately isn’t the whole story; we don’t have children because of Facebook.

At this time, my only reference point for children comes from movies, television and of course Facebook. The issue is, there’s a huge gap between how children are portrayed in movies and television and how they’re portrayed by “real life” parents on the world’s greatest social networking site. Because movies and television have much higher budgets, I tend to follow what they have to say about parenting but it’s hard not to let the views of “real life” parents disturb the wholesome imagery that circulates around this topic.

First off, I’ve seen movies/television shows where people are both parents and super human soldiers, magicians or any number of other cool professions. Despite such daunting feats, they’re still able to juggle their many responsibilities while also having the time to goof off with friends and do other extracurricular activities. Facebook parents on the other hand, sound really super tired and super busy all the time. I love free time and often give my wife dirty looks when she gives me one chore too many on my daily chore list. A baby is like a daily chore list times a million but unlike my current chore list, getting distracted and forgetting about it wouldn’t be easily remedied by an impromptu song about forgetfulness.

Without free time, you can’t do things like party, toss back beers with your bros and stay up too late. These are things we could only dream of when we were kids, yet according to Facebook such antics are “irresponsible”. Really? I’ve seen plenty of movies where the zany yet misunderstood dad wakes up with a hangover only to realize that his kids have tried to make him breakfast, causing him to hilariously slip in pancake batter as he makes his way to join in on the fun.

Another problem I have with Facebook parents is this whole disciplining kids and being a good example thing. Movies/television parents do funny but sometimes controversial stuff all the time but the same things, according to Facebook parents apparently leave bad impressions on their youngsters. This means ultra tight stuff like playing violent video games, eating pizza for every meal and talking about sex in humorous ways is completely off limits. If that’s true, then I’d probably have the amount of free time needed to care for children.

My biggest issue, however (which may be the result of their humility) is that Facebook parents don’t report about their kids’ fantastical adventures enough. I hear all about their experiences in school, the cute things they do and their unique pooping habits but according to movies/television, there’s a whole lot more going on behind the scenes. Where are the pictures of them and their magical gnome friends riding house cats around the yard? Where’s the story about how your kid and their buddies stumbled across lost pirate treasure? Why aren’t you bragging about your children and their ninja training progress? I get it, you don’t want to be the parents that boast about their children’s accomplishments all the time but by doing so you’re making it appear as if the aforementioned scenarios are merely works of fiction conjured up in a Hollywood sound stage.

Being that I haven’t really experienced parenthood, it’d be bold of me to tell people how to do their jobs. That being said, is it too much to ask that for you to start being more open and make having kids sound really awesome?