- 3 months ago
WHEN the Penny family went viral on social media, they could never have imagined what would happen next. After starting their content creator journey during Covid lockdown, parents Laura and Simon have posted daily videos documenting their everyday lives ever since. They've involved their three children Lexi (15), Will (13) and Ivy (5) in everything from dance trends to "plate up" videos to shopping hauls, all of which has now become a "side hustle" for the family. This in turn has caused a backlash in their comments section - with many accusing the parents of "exploiting" their children. But as Laura explained to Truly, "The kids love making content with us, they want to do it. We would never force them to do anything that they don't want to do." When their eldest Lexi turned 13, the parents even helped her set up her own separate account so that she could record makeup tutorials and her following quickly snowballed, now sitting at over 180,000 followers. Laura and Simon were always cautious with Lexi's account, setting parental controls to keep tabs on the messages and comments Lexi received. As Simon explained, "We're not foolish, we understand there are risks out there." But they were "shocked" to learn that Lexi's images had been taken by a stranger and "doctored" - their 15-year-old daughter had been deepfaked. Laura admits that they did initially question whether they were to blame: "When we first became aware it was a bit like, 'Oh God'" - the parents reported the images and successfully had them removed, but Lexi did see them and found them "strange." Laura and Simon gave Lexi the freedom to choose whether to continue and did not consider banning her from social media - a decision they stand by to this day. But Laura's sister and Lexi's aunt Nicky was initially sceptical about the family's very public social media presence. So when she visits today - and with Laura still not sure how she feels about "the deepfake situation" - will Laura's previous feelings of guilt bubble back to the surface?
Follow the family:
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61566957957331
https://www.tiktok.com/@thepennyfam
https://www.youtube.com/@thepennyfam
https://www.instagram.com/thepennyfamily1
Follow the family:
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61566957957331
https://www.tiktok.com/@thepennyfam
https://www.youtube.com/@thepennyfam
https://www.instagram.com/thepennyfamily1
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FunTranscript
00:00Our 15 year old daughter got deep faked.
00:02But we won't ban her from social media.
00:04We're a family of content creators.
00:06How do you feel knowing that thousands of people watching the world?
00:10People accuse us of exploiting our children.
00:13Family vloggers just don't sit right with me at all.
00:15Money talks. Poor kid.
00:17I started my account when I was around 13.
00:19I think she's got 180,000 followers now.
00:22So how do you react when you became aware of actually being deep faked?
00:26Do you have any feelings of guilt or regret?
00:31Right, do you want to grab the stuff out of the fridge?
00:33I'll cut these up.
00:34Is this how your normal day begins?
00:36Pretty much, yeah. Breakfast.
00:38Get everybody sorted and ready and dressed.
00:41Ready for school?
00:42Yep, ready for school.
00:43Well, Ivy.
00:45Normal kind of family stuff.
00:48Have I done breakfast?
00:49We are family content creators.
00:51We have over 800,000 followers and our children are TikTok makers.
00:55Do you record content on your stations every day?
00:57Yeah, we record every day. We always do a plate up in the evening because people ask for it.
01:02They're like, oh, is the plate up happening tonight?
01:03We like doing it as well. It's just a bit of fun.
01:05Yeah, just a bit of fun, isn't it? Do you want some honey?
01:08Yes, please.
01:09Lexi, what are the dishing up videos?
01:11Well, mum basically gets everything in the bowl and then the camera goes up there and then you can see
01:16down everything.
01:18Is your mum a good cook?
01:19Yeah.
01:20Yeah, that's it.
01:21We try and capture moments and share it. That's kind, isn't it, Will?
01:28And then we do lives as well. We go live on different platforms, don't we?
01:31That's kind of a good way to talk with people as well.
01:33Just interact with people.
01:34This is where the magic happens.
01:37And I am so hungry.
01:38How do you feel knowing that thousands of people watch what you're doing?
01:44She's famous, doesn't she?
01:46She does. She tells people she's famous.
01:48Oh, look at that.
01:49You're so happy.
01:51Yummy.
01:52Our family life is pretty crazy. There's always a child needing to be somewhere and another one needing to be
01:57somewhere else.
01:58We're busy, aren't we?
01:59Yeah.
02:00What's your favourite video you've recorded with your family?
02:04It's probably one of the collaboration ones. We get to go somewhere.
02:08Like your cinema or...?
02:10Our family is a blended family. So between us, we have five children.
02:17I've got two from a previous marriage, which are Lexi and Will.
02:20I had two grown up children.
02:22And then we've got Ivy.
02:24How would you describe each of your parenting styles?
02:26I think our parenting has sort of blended together more recent years.
02:31We try and empower them to make their own good choices.
02:35Go on then Ivy.
02:36Shopping hall.
02:38There we go. So me and the kids have been shopping and they want to show you what they've got.
02:42Come on then.
02:43When and why did you start recording videos of your family life?
02:47The first one was actually in lockdown.
02:49You did that football one in the living room, didn't you?
02:51Was it that long ago?
02:52Yeah. And then we didn't post anything for ages.
02:54And then there was another trend.
02:56One wash, baby.
02:57Check it out.
02:58Perfect.
02:59That ****.
03:00Yeah.
03:00And Lexi and Simon filmed it in here.
03:03And then the kids were like, oh, let's see if we can get a hundred followers.
03:05Before we knew it, the kids were like, oh, mum, we're going to hit a thousand.
03:09And then it just grew from there.
03:12How do you decide which kids are going to be in what videos?
03:15Whoever wants to.
03:17I was going to say, they sort that out.
03:19Generally, if they want to be in it, they're in it.
03:21If they don't, then they're not.
03:23We never really worried about including the kids in our content.
03:26I think for us, maybe we look at it slightly differently as an opportunity, maybe.
03:29Yeah, I mean, it's opened loads of doors to them and to us as a family.
03:34It's a side piece of work, you know, a job.
03:37Side job.
03:37Yeah, like a side hustle.
03:38Yeah.
03:39Yes, there is a financial element, but they earn their own, they earn their own money.
03:44Which sort of videos get the most views?
03:46Do you find it's controversial stuff that is most engaging?
03:49We don't, like some of the viral ones that we've had.
03:53So we had your start of school one, didn't we?
03:56Right then, Lex, are you ready for your first day back of school?
03:59And people were in uproar about how short her dress, her skirt was.
04:03That had something like 5 million views or something ridiculous.
04:06Yeah.
04:07And I actually stayed up and watched 900,000, a million.
04:12I was like, what?
04:14Just because you've got a kid who's wearing a new uniform.
04:16What is the response like in the comments section for the stuff you've got?
04:20We have had a few judgmental comments, haven't we?
04:23Yes.
04:23Family vloggers just don't sit right with me at all.
04:26Okay.
04:27They're on your feed, so you must be looking at family vloggers.
04:30Sad bunch of .
04:31Putting their entire life on video for all to see.
04:34Seriously?
04:35.
04:36Wow.
04:37That was a good one.
04:38That was a good one.
04:39People accuse us of exploiting our children, but the kids love making content with us.
04:43They want to do it.
04:44Money talks.
04:45Poor kid.
04:45People see us a snippet of our life, don't they?
04:48They have no idea who we are, what we do.
04:51You know, behind the scenes.
04:52We would never force them to do anything that they didn't want to do.
04:55And occasionally.
04:56Yeah, they don't.
04:57Yeah, Lexi will say, I'm not going to pay up today.
04:58And it's like, absolutely fine.
05:00You don't have to.
05:00This is my room.
05:01Put my phone there.
05:03Record basically all my videos.
05:05When and why did you decide to set up a separate TikTok account for Lexi?
05:09I always feel that if we said, no, you're not having social media, they're going to do it anyway.
05:14Okay, so I got sent this bracelet the other day, and I'm going to give you guys a bracelet tour.
05:18And there's got loads of different jewels in there.
05:20I'm going to show you guys all of them.
05:21But we've set it so that it's on my phone as well as hers, so that everything that she posts
05:26is managed by us.
05:27I first started kind of experimenting with makeup.
05:30How old was I, like, 11?
05:31Yeah, probably about 11.
05:32And then as I was, like, 13, I kind of got onto, like, TikTok and stuff.
05:35I started my TikTok account when I was around 13.
05:37And you can kind of see, if you scroll back down, you can, like, watch as my account's grown from
05:41having, like, 5,000 followers to, like, 180,000.
05:44Do you have any concerns about strangers watching Lexi's videos?
05:49We have had concerns.
05:51We're not foolish.
05:52We understand there are risks out there and exposure to potentially not very nice things.
05:58One of our followers messaged us to let us know that there's somebody on Facebook that is stealing Lexi's image.
06:04And they're, like, AI-ing it a little bit.
06:07Oh, yeah.
06:07I'd never seen anything like that.
06:08They've made, like, her boobs bigger.
06:10Yeah.
06:11Changed her face slightly.
06:12So it still looks like Lexi.
06:14You could tell it had been...
06:15Yeah, it's been shopped.
06:17...doctored from her image.
06:18Lexi, those photos, have you seen those?
06:22Did you go and show you them at the time?
06:23Oh.
06:23Yeah, I've seen them.
06:25It's a bit strange.
06:27Like, I'm a bit bothered, but I'm not, like, extremely bothered, because it's just...
06:30There's nothing to gain from it.
06:32I think we were just kind of shocked as to why somebody would do it.
06:37Obviously, we wanted to get it taken down.
06:39We did report it.
06:40Facebook took it down, and we did talk to Lexi about being deep faked.
06:44But it didn't seem to bother her.
06:46She was very much like, ah, okay.
06:48It's been a little bit of a learning curve, but it hasn't made you want to stop posting,
06:52has it?
06:53No.
06:53I've made so many friends for it, and I've had so many opportunities.
06:56I've been invited to, like, events.
06:57I've been to parties.
06:58I've met so many people for that, and, yeah, I really enjoy doing it.
07:02Do you have any feelings of guilt or regret for what happened?
07:05I think when it...
07:07When we first became aware, it was a bit like, oh, God.
07:10Is this because of what we're doing?
07:13Yeah.
07:13But not ever considered banning them on social media.
07:16I do think that kids are going to do what they're going to do, whether you like it or not.
07:23Hello!
07:24My sister's coming over this afternoon.
07:26She didn't really agree with us posting our children on social media to start with.
07:30So what did you think when we first started posting content?
07:33I have to be honest, I was concerned.
07:36I was worried.
07:37You know, what negative effects are they going to feel from it?
07:41I think my sister was just unsure about what could happen.
07:45And I'm not really sure how she feels about the deepfakes situation.
07:49When you heard about the deepfakes of Lexi, did you feel like we were to blame?
07:53What, you two?
07:54Yeah.
07:55No.
07:56No.
07:57Because whoever it was could get pictures of anybody from anywhere.
08:02Yeah.
08:03But did you feel like, because we allowed her to post, do you think that could have...
08:07She'd post herself anyway.
08:09Yeah.
08:09Even if it wasn't on your page, it would be on her own page.
08:12Yeah.
08:12That's how we've looked at it, isn't it?
08:14Yeah.
08:14Like, that could happen to anyone, couldn't it?
08:16On any...
08:17You could be walking down the street and they take a photograph of you.
08:19Yeah, exactly.
08:19So do you think we should be banning the kids from social media?
08:23You could try.
08:25If you tell somebody that they can't do something, they're going to want to do it even more, aren't they?
08:29But if they can do it in a safe way with guidance, then I would 100% go that way
08:35rather than doing it on their own.
08:37And I guess Lexi probably learnt from that, didn't she?
08:40Yeah, exactly.
08:41Of why...
08:42Just be careful.
08:44What you post.
08:46What would you say to people who are judging or continuing to put your kids online?
08:50I respect people's opinion. Everyone's entitled to their own opinion.
08:54And if you don't want to put your kids online, then don't do it. It's up to you.
08:58And if you don't like watching mine, then don't put yourself through it.
09:01Yeah.
09:01You know, it is a choice. You don't have to.
09:04I don't have any regrets not banning social media.
09:07I think overall, it's a really positive experience for us.
09:10Yes, we have had a little bit of negativity, the deep fake stuff, but it's minute in comparison to...
09:16And it's here to stay, isn't it?
09:17Yeah.
09:17It's going to grow, whether the platforms will change, but it's not going anywhere.
09:21I'd like to think that, you know, Lexi can use her platform for the future.
09:25She can earn money through her platform, see where it takes her.
09:28And, you know, she might turn around and say, I've ordered that, don't want to do it.
09:31And that's absolutely fine.
09:33Do you think you'll ever stop making content with your family?
09:36No, probably not.
09:37Unless we want it.
09:38But we don't want it.
09:39Yeah.
09:39It's like part of our routine now.
09:41It's not like a, oh, we've got to go do this now.
09:43It's a, let's go do this now.
09:45Are you excited about the future?
09:47Yeah.
09:47It's always exciting to think about what's to come, where the kids are going to end up,
09:51will they take social media with them?
09:53Of course it's exciting.
09:53We started this, what, two years ago?
09:56It could all end tomorrow.
09:57Yeah, it could be.
09:57But, you know.
09:58But it's been an adventure, isn't it?
10:00Yeah, it's been good fun.
10:01Yeah.
10:05We'll give you an opportunity to do it.
10:06But I'm not then alone, please.
10:11The internet includes
10:11people who didn't lose anything. And I'm
10:12the only one else before would wait to see there are a lot of answers.
10:16You
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