Fresh Take: Fortesa Latifi on the Truth About Kids in Influencer Families

What Fresh Hell: Laughing in the Face of Motherhood | Parenting Tips From Funny Moms

What Fresh Hell: Laughing in the Face of Motherhood

Kids & Family, Comedy, Parenting

4.8 • 1K Ratings

🗓️ 17 April 2026

⏱️ 43 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

What happens when childhood becomes content? Journalist Fortesa Latifi, author of the new book LIKE, FOLLOW, SUBSCRIBE, discusses the rise of influencer families and the growing world of kid influencers. We explore how parenting content has evolved from "mommy blogs" to today’s visual and monetized social media landscape, where children are often at the center of viral content. Fortesa explains why family vlogging is so compelling, and the powerful parasocial relationships audiences form with influencer families. She also breaks down the ethical gray areas of sharing kids online, including issues of privacy, consent, and the long-term digital footprint created for children who cannot fully understand or agree to their online presence. Fortesa discusses the role of viewers in driving demand for this content and the emerging legal efforts to regulate earnings and protect influencer kids. She offers a nuanced look at family vlogging, encouraging parents and audiences alike to think more critically about what it means to share children’s lives online. Here's where you can find Fortesa: https://www.fortesalatifi.com @hifortesa on socials Buy LIKE, FOLLOW, SUBSCRIBE: https://bookshop.org/a/12099/9781668080504 What Fresh Hell is co-hosted by Amy Wilson and Margaret Ables. We love the sponsors that make this show possible! You can always find all the special deals and codes for all our current sponsors on our website: ⁠https://www.whatfreshhellpodcast.com/p/promo-codes/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:31.9	Hello, everyone and welcome to Fresh Take from What Fresh Hell, laughing in the face of
0:36.7	motherhood. This is Margaret.
0:38.2	And this is Amy. Today we're talking to Fortessa Latifi. She is a journalist who has spent
0:42.8	years reporting on influencers, kid influencers, reality TV families, and the kids growing up inside
0:49.3	all of it. Fortessa's work has been featured in Teen Vogue, Rolling Stone, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and more. Today, we'll be talking about Fortessa's new book, like, follow, subscribe, influencer kids, and the cost of a childhood online. Welcome, Fertessa. Hi, thank you for having me. So you start the book where Amy and I both started our journey in the parenting space
1:14.0	with kind of the OG mom bloggers.
1:17.4	So take us to that time for those who cannot cast their memories back that far.
1:23.7	Tell us about this era of the first of the mommy bloggers.
1:28.0	Well, it feels funny for me to be telling you guys about it since you were part.
1:31.8	We lived it.
1:33.3	Yeah, yeah.
1:34.4	But I think the original mommy bloggers were really kind of fascinating because, I mean, as you all can attest to, you were writing these thousands of word essays, plundering the emotional depths of,
1:47.3	you know, infertility and miscarriage and potty training and raising your kids. And it was really
1:52.9	this interesting space and time on the internet because for a while it wasn't profitable. And so
1:59.3	there was kind of this like preciousness to it because it was just for each other and for yourselves.
2:05.5	It was also extremely written word and not visual back in the day.
2:11.2	I remember Margaret's blog, actually, Margaret had a blog called Short Fat Dictator back in the day.
	...

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