Kidfluencing… Has It Gone Too Far?

Content warning: sexual assault.

Recently, I sat down to watch Bad Influence: The Dark Side of Kidfluencing on Netflix. The three-episode series centers around social media influencer Piper Rockelle and “The Squad,” the group of teenagers she filmed social media content with. I have fond memories of watching these videos for hours on end, especially when we were quarantined during the COVID-19 pandemic. These kids, who were all about my age, were seemingly having a blast filming this content, all while hanging out and laughing together. I envied this, as I sat in my room alone, missing my friends and any sense of a social life. I found some comfort in watching the videos from “The Squad,” sometimes imagining what it would be like if I could film and create the same content they were. 

However, the process of creating this content was far from the fun and joy that was published for the world to see. The documentary focuses on the experiences these former members endured while creating content, many of which they claimed to be highly influenced by Rockelle’s mother, Tiffany. Tiffany, as many of the former members recalled, was extremely motivated by the growing profit her daughter’s videos were making across different social media platforms. In order to continue making this content, she put the children under circumstances that made them very comfortable, and consistently worked them to their limits. Many of these children were between eleven and fourteen years old at the time, and were forced to work for about thirteen hours per day in creating content, giving them very limited time to pursue other aspects of their lives, such as their education and having their own downtime. 

    Beyond this, the documentary puts Tiffany in a highly controversial light. Many of her problematic actions were documented, including an instance where she appeared to have forcibly kissed a minor on a livestream without their consent. Additionally, many of the former squad members accused Tiffany of sexually assaulting them, even while they were just young adolescents.

    This piece would be a lot longer if I described all of the details that were recounted in this series. Additionally, it is known that Netflix tends to skew its content to reflect a very specific side of the story. However, the fact that multiple victims were interviewed, who all described several different traumatic experiences caused by Tiffany, with accounts going as far as sexual assault, proves that clearly many things occurred that should not have. 

     Unfortunately, the case of “The Squad” is nothing too out of the ordinary nowadays in the media. Ruby Franke, who published videos for YouTube, was arrested back in 2023 and charged with multiple counts of felony aggravated child abuse. Her channel “8 Passengers” had over two million subscribers, with her videos focusing on the day-to-day life of her family and experiences parenting her children. Franke received backlash for her controversial ways of parenting throughout the course of her channel, but it took years until action was finally taken to stop it. 

    Some states, such as California and Illinois, have enacted laws to help regulate the relationship between family and “kidfluencing” channels. These laws force the minors of the children to obtain a certain portion of the income they receive from their content to be placed into a trust account, so they can use these earnings once they are eighteen years old. Still, there are a very limited number of laws available that provide support to these “kidfluencers” to protect their youth and prevent exploitation by older adults who run their channels. For example, there is the argument that if the government proceeds to censor and limit specific types of content online, it is a violation of the First Amendment right in the Constitution to free speech, which is a major reason why there aren’t as many regulations in this industry. 

    The case of “The Squad” and Piper Rockelle, and many other child influencers, is truly devastating and unimaginable, especially for children at such young ages. With much of the behind-the-scenes work of the social media world masked, these children and many more may undergo awful occurrences that can severely affect their lives going into adulthood. Social media is supposed to be a place of expression and inspiration, and the processes taken to make that content should reflect those same principles. State and federal laws and regulations must be put into place in ways that do not limit free speech to protect underage social media influencers.