Highly publicised family crises amongst the rich and famous are nothing new. The use of social media to air grievances and fire shots, however, is a relatively recent phenomenon, and one that brings significant legal and reputational risk. Here, we discuss why airing dirty laundry during a dispute is rarely a good idea.
A new year, a new UK institution facing reputational hardship and familial turmoil.
Much like Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s split from the Royal Family, the bust up between Brooklyn Beckham and his parents, David and Victoria, has highlighted the reputational mutually assured destruction that can occur when one family member decides to take a private dispute into the public eye.
What does Brooklyn Beckham allege?
Rumours of a rift between Sir David and Victoria Beckham and their son, 26-year-old Brooklyn, started to surface in 2022 in the build-up to, and aftermath of, Brooklyn’s marriage to US actress Nicola Peltz.
These rumours died down, only to resurface in May 2025 following Brooklyn and Nicola’s noticeable absence from David Beckham’s 50th birthday party.
During this time, both sides had neither confirmed nor denied the rumours and reports. That is until 19 January, when Brooklyn posted an 821-word statement on his personal Instagram account acknowledging the feud to an audience of around 16 million followers.
In addition to confirming that he did “not want to reconcile with [his] family”, Brooklyn took the opportunity to levy some very specific allegations against his parents. These ranged from a highly serious accusation of being “controlled by [his] parents for most of [his] life”, to complaints of how his mother “danced very inappropriately on [him] in front of everyone” during his wedding reception.
How have the Beckhams managed their reputation?
In the main, Brooklyn took the opportunity to highlight the cracks in his family’s façade, divulging the details of how, and to what extent, the image of the Beckhams had been heavily curated over the years.
“The performative social media posts, family events and inauthentic relationships have been a fixture of the life I was born into,” he says, later adding: “My family values public promotion and endorsements above all else. Brand Beckham comes first.”
This is hardly revelatory. The Beckham family has dominated the headlines of tabloids and gossip magazines since David and Victoria first announced their engagement on the driveway of a Cheshire hotel in 1998. During this time, the Beckhams have shown themselves to be highly adept at, and proactive with, engaging with the media and curating their personal image.
In 1999, for example, they sold the story of their wedding to OK! Magazine for £1m, with reports stating that they had been deciding which photos to send to the media whilst their guests were still partying.
From 2019, their publicity was managed entirely in-house, including the production company that created the highly successful Netflix docuseries ‘Beckham’.
Even allegations of David’s extra-marital affair in 2004 did little to derail a smooth and decades-long campaign to showcase the Beckhams as a happy, wealthy and highly successful family.
Why is it risky to publicly discuss private disputes?
This time, however, may be different. The explosive allegations have come from the Beckhams’ own son, with some of his claims even suggesting abusive and controlling behaviour.
Nor is it just David and Victoria’s reputations on the line. In announcing his grievances so publicly, Brooklyn places himself at risk of reputational and legal repercussions as much as he does his own family.
For Brooklyn, risks could extend to claims for defamation, particularly regarding his comments of controlling behaviour, if these are deemed to meet the test for ‘serious harm’. Given Brooklyn’s gargantuan social media following, as well as the widespread and global dissemination of his statement in the press, it is likely that they would meet this test unless he were able to prove that they are true.
Brooklyn could also damage his credibility irreparably if others were to forensically examine the accuracy and consistency of some of his more specific claims. Indeed, the public has already proven itself to be highly adept at this following the identification of Baby Reindeer’s real-life ‘Martha’ back in 2024.
In any event, defamation claims from either side would mean unearthing yet more personal and intimate details of the Beckhams’ family life in what would undoubtedly be a long and expensive legal battle.
Can a social media post be defamatory?
Whether comments on social media can be considered defamatory will depend on a number of factors, such as the meaning of the comments, how they could be interpreted by the reader, and their potential to reach, and be shared by, a large audience.
The longer a defamatory post is online, the more harmful it may be considered to be. That being said, even a post that is published for two minutes and subsequently deleted may be considered to have caused serious harm if it is shared from a high-profile account with millions of followers. Posts can be ‘screenshotted’, images can be saved, and words can be paraphrased by other users. Once the genie is out of the bottle, it is almost impossible to get it back inside.
In highly emotional and personal disputes, particularly amongst family members, it can be tempting to put one’s side of the story to the public to ‘set the record straight’.
Making allegations or claims publicly over social media is rarely a good idea, however. Not only does it leave one at risk of claims for defamation, but it also significantly reduces the chances of resolution through less expensive methods such as mediation. Furthermore, the courts have demonstrated a very dim view of parties that divulge disputes or claims over public forums such as Instagram or Facebook.
Before posting in anger or frustration, it is wise to ask yourself if you would be comfortable with a judge reading the post aloud in court, and what you hope to gain from such public declarations.
It is often far better, and more productive, to seek legal advice from, and communicate via, legal professionals, than it is to fire shots in the court of public opinion. In doing so, both sides are more likely to protect their reputations, come to an amicable solution, and move on with their lives.
How David and Victoria will respond to these allegations is, at the time of writing, anyone’s guess. Nevertheless, in just over 800 words, Brooklyn has dealt a deadly blow to his parents’ reputation, and perhaps even his own. How the family will recover from this remains to be seen but, as we have already seen with Harry and Meghan, airing dirty laundry in public makes it much harder to clean.