Reading the comments on the photo actress Hilary Duff posted on her Instagram this month, of her kissing her four year old son Luca, I rubbed my eyes in disbelief.
“Inappropriate…disgusting…say no to incest…”
On and on the trolls went, unleashing their warped fury at a perfectly innocent and super sweet snap, taken during a family day out at Disneyland.
It’s easy to just roll our eyes and write off trolling like this as a few nutters with nothing better to do, but the truth is there are plenty of sane, ‘normal’ people who think kissing your child on the lips is not just gross, but practically a form of child abuse.
Remember American child psychologist Dr Charlotte Reznick, who last year said that kissing your kids on the lips is “too sexual”? She claimed that the mouth is an erogenous zone which can be “too stimulating” and cause confusion for children.
Seriously, is this how low we’ve sunk as a society that a mother showing affection to her child is deemed to be offensive or tantamount to child abuse? Oh please, I have seriously never heard anything so ridiculous.
I’ve kissed my little boy Ruadhán, now nineteen months old, on the lips since the day he was born. And plan to do so for many years to come, both privately and in public.
Why? Because I love him, and I want to express that love in the most natural way possible by showing him affection.
Kissing him is not the same as kissing my husband, the love I feel for them is totally different, and frankly anyone who can’t make that distinction is a moron if you ask me, with a twisted mind.
I’d love to ask these trolls what bothers them so much about an innocent kiss, why they find a moment of intimacy between a mother and her child so infuriating?
Sadly Hilary Duff’s not the first celebrity to fall foul of the kissing kids police.
A beautiful photo of Victoria Beckham kissing Harper on the lips earlier this year sparked an almighty backlash, with critics claiming it looked as if they were ‘making out’.
Given she’s married to one of the hottest men alive, I suspect VB doesn’t need to resort to her daughter if she fancies a proper smooch, for God’s sake.
Goodness knows what the trolls would make of the fact that I regularly bath and shower with Ruadhán, and have no issue being naked around him. If that’s incest, well, call me a hillbilly because as far as I’m concerned that’s just part of being a mother and child, with a healthy, natural relationship.
Of course there comes a point when a mother kissing her child on the lips is no longer appropriate.
When Sam Faier’s boyfriend Paul Knightley was filmed getting a smacker on the lips from him mum Gaynor, in The Baby Diaries earlier this year, I cringed.
After a certain age, mum’s kisses should be reserved for the cheeks or forehead, and for me that time will come when Ruadhán hits his teenage years, unless he decides sooner he’s not comfortable with a peck on the lips.
But for now I’ll carry on showing my boy how much I love him by puckering up.
After all we teach children by example, and I want him to grow up into an affectionate and loving man, who’s not afraid to show the people closest to him that he loves them.
Mwah!
Do you agree with our writer that kissing your children on their lips is natural thing for a loving parent to do? Or do you think it's inappropriate? Let us know over on Facebook or Twitter.