Some baby-picture haters try to get cute and mask their disdain with a question like this one sent to The New York Times Magazine's Ethicist:

Now, I love babies and feel it's acceptable to post a photo from a holiday gathering or a first picture of a newborn. But when this happens every day from a specific acquaintance, is it a violation of the baby's privacy? The baby did not sign up for a Facebook account, does not understand the concept of Facebook and obviously was not asked permission to have its pictures on the site

Obviously this is ridiculous. (The Ethicist's Chuck Klosterman concludes: "There's no best case in which a newborn can comprehend the abstraction of privacy. The world's smartest baby still doesn't know anything.")

It's OK not to like babies. It's OK not to like baby pictures. But complaining about them being on Facebook is like complaining about a dog park being overrun with dogs.

There are, of course, legitimate reasons to hate being inundated with babies every time you log on to Facebook — for people with fertility issues, or those who have lost a child, it can be particularly painful. But with some selective blocking and disconnecting, that can be mitigated.

And largely speaking, the anti-baby-picture brigade seems to be most frequently motivated by a peculiar narcissism. The hater often assumes his or her own reactions matter far more than they actually do. Were I a parent, I believe I'd find it hard to care whether the college roommate I haven't spoken to in years thinks my baby pictures are annoying. I doubt I'd count the number of "likes" on each picture and stress about whether the colleague from three jobs ago thinks the baby is cute. I'd be past that — rather, I'd be thinking about the family I've created, the friends and family members who love and care for me and my children, who cheer us on as we figure out this adventure.

One young couple, Jameil and Rashan, who I've known via the internet for years — in fact, they met through their respective (now-defunct) blogs back in the mid-aughts — is now expecting their first child. One of the attendant anxieties of having a new baby is their Facebook picture strategy.

"I want to have a teeny bit of sense," Jameil said. "Maybe not post 15 pics of the same outfit the same day. But no pics isn't an option. We know too many people solely or chiefly online." (Her husband, Rashan, added: "Tons of pictures. If they don't like it they can get over it.")

Getting over it — or getting past it — seems to be a theme among some new parents.

"I like seeing pics of my friends' kids, but I think I'm biased as a new father," said my friend Tom. He and his wife Julie welcomed their first child, Zeke, last month. "I can't actually imagine that others would find it annoying, especially since you can scroll past those posts in a fraction of a second."

Tom's pictures of Zeke are currently one of the best parts of my Facebook feed: