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META LAUNCHES PROGRAM TO CURB EPIDEMIC OF UGLY BABIES ON FACEBOOK AND INSTAGRAM
Mary Martino’s mornings always start the same way: Wake up, throw on a pot of coffee, plop down at the kitchen table and hop on Instagram. But this morning, before she even had a chance to start scrolling, Mary found the following message waiting in her inbox:
Dear Mrs. Martino,
It’s been brought to our attention that, in your eagerness to share your new bundle of joy with the world, you’ve actually been causing your friends and family members a considerable amount of pain. There’s no easy way to say this, so we’ll just say it: Your baby looks like a contestant on Chernobyl’s Got Talent. And a sizable portion of your 538 followers have, quite frankly, had enough. While the decision to continue posting your baby is ultimately yours, we’d be remiss if we didn’t inform you of the current situation. We ask that you remove your maternally-colored lenses and take a cold, hard look at a recent photo of your child…
Now ask yourself: Should I really be subjecting my followers to this everyday?
Sincerely,
Zuck & Company
Unfortunately, Mrs. Martino has the dubious honor of being one of the first individuals to receive this message, which is part of a new program being rolled out by Meta in an attempt to slow the scourge of ugly babies running positively rampant on its platforms.
You may have noticed that Meta has begun including a thumbs down option on all baby photos on Facebook and Instagram. If pressed, this button will send an anonymous message to Meta informing them that you consider said baby to be an objective eyesore.
If a baby receives enough downvotes, the user responsible for posting the baby will receive a message similar to the one above, informing them of the unsightliness of their child and providing the sobering data to back it up.
As of this writing, over 148,000 Facebook and Instagram users have received a message informing them of the ugliness of their baby. Many have deleted their profiles due to sheer embarrassment. Others have posted lengthy tirades to their page, some going so far as to @ those they suspect of downvoting their kid.
On the bright side, a few users have actually owned up to the fact that they are, indeed, the progenitors of ghastly babies. One such user, Gretchen Gorgonzola, scrubbed all of her one-year-old’s photos off the internet. She then posted the following statement to her Instagram: “1) My apologies, everyone. 2) Just to be clear: Baby takes after her father.”
Mark J. Burton II is The Pie’s Chief Writing Officer. He doesn’t have the heart to thumbs down any of the babies on his timeline… but he’d be glad to send you a list so you can do it for him. You can find Mark on Twitter & IG.
