A daughter has questioned whether she was in the wrong after she refused to post edited photos of her father’s influencer girlfriend on Instagram.
In a post shared to the Am I the A**hole forum on Reddit, a woman started the post by explaining that her father’s girlfriend is very active on social media, often posting twice a day. She wrote that she and her husband noticed the girlfriend’s habit of retouching her photos to make her waistline smaller as well as airbrushing her facial features.
It wasn’t until one weekend, when her family threw the woman a birthday party, that her suspicions were confirmed.
“Last week, my friends and family threw me a surprise party to celebrate both my birthday and my first year of being a mom,” she wrote. “I later made a post on Instagram thanking everyone, in which I included several pictures from the party.”
A few hours after the party, her father requested that she add a photo with his girlfriend to the photo carousel, which she begrudgingly did with the one photo the girlfriend was in.
“I was frustrated, but deleted it and reposted it with a picture of me, my husband, our baby, my father and his girlfriend,” she continued. “It was the only one I had of her at the party.”
However, hours after she posted the new version of the post, the girlfriend messaged her to ask if she could replace the photo she shared with a Photoshopped one. But the edited photo didn’t just retouch her, it also retouched the rest of the family, whitening their teeth and airbrushing their faces.
“I said no,” she recalled. “While she’s free to post whatever she wants on her socials, I don’t want an obviously Photoshopped picture on mine.”
To her surprise, the girlfriend was adamant that she take the photo down. She told the daughter that the unedited photo would “clash” with her Instagram feed, and as a result, she would lose followers. Her father then asked his daughter to “humor” the girlfriend.
“I’m aware of that, I just don’t want to do it,” she concluded, adding that this whole situation has become annoying. “I didn’t even want to include the picture in the first place, I only did it because they wanted me to.”
People in the comment section sided with the daughter, with many arguing that the girlfriend shouldn’t be telling the daughter what to post regardless of whether or not the photos match her aesthetic.
One person said: “Even if the account was not private, you’re free to post. It’s your account. It’s not that you were posting revenge pics, or hateful things. So a simple no is enough - no discussion needed. Personally, I’d leave the picture up. To me removing it is falling into her demands.”
“She’s free to post whatever Photoshopped version of reality she wants... but on yours, you can post the real photos, with her real thick waist and her yellow teeth,” another commented. “It’s your wall, not hers. It’s private, so she doesn’t have to worry about her followers seeing, unless they are the handful of people who follow you both.
The original poster replied: “I see my social media more as a photo album than anything else. I wouldn’t want to put things that aren’t real or didn’t happen on an album. I also want to add that she’s a fairly skinny woman with normal, clean teeth. From my perspective, there’s no reason for her to edit her pictures like this.”
Other people noted that the girlfriend’s need to control not only her image but those of others indicated an “unhealthy” obsession with appearances.
“She has an unhealthy focus on appearances - not just hers, either,” someone wrote. “That means NOW is the time for you to decide what your policy is on Photoshopping your child. Set clear boundaries and consequences. Be proactive - do not give her the chance to ‘improve’ your child’s appearance.”
