What the Beckham family feud reveals about social media and our love of ‘mess’
My social media feed has been full of Brooklyn Beckham memes. That is, since January 19, when David and Victoria Beckham’s eldest son posted a series of Instagram stories criticising his parents, their curated public personas and what he described as long-standing slights towards him and his wife, actress Nicola Peltz.
As a researcher of online harms and freedom of speech, I’m less interested in whether the memes are funny than in what Brooklyn Beckham versus brand Beckham tells us about how social media – and public shaming – are changing.
After months of rumours of a rift between the Beckhams and their eldest, in his posts Brooklyn publicly accused his parents of a lifetime of carefully managed media narratives about the family. He alleged that family love hinged upon engaging with “performative social media posts, family events and inauthentic relationships”.
The memes posted by the public in response range from critiques of Brooklyn’s shortlived stint as a photographer to parodies of Victoria Beckham’s alleged “inappropriate” first dance takeover at Brooklyn’s wedding.
Some are undeniably funny. But taken together with other recent outbreaks of celebrity “mess”, the episode highlights social media’s shift from a space of connection to one of spectacle – where intimate conflict becomes collective entertainment, with real-world consequences.
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In a recent study, my colleague Pam Briggs and I found that social media users are becoming disillusioned with digital spaces where their belonging depends on an algorithm’s whim. Participants described feeling overwhelmed by targeted commercial content while struggling to see posts from friends and family.
Brooklyn alleged that for the Beckhams: “Family ‘love’ is decided by how much you post on social media.” That logic sits uneasily at a moment when social media platforms are no longer primarily “social” spaces, but increasingly function as sites of entertainment, surveillance and sales. Our collective appetite for viral celebrity mess appears closely connected to this shift.
Public betrayals, viral memes
Late last year, singer Lily Allen made a return to our playlists with West End Girl, a self-described work of “autofiction” originating from the breakdown of her marriage to Stranger Things actor David Harbour.
The album played with dissonance by blending fast-paced beats and clinically detailed, seemingly personal tales of infidelity. In the process, Allen rode the wave of memes as a marketing strategy. Allen herself recently posted an image of her album cover with Brooklyn’s head photoshopped onto it to her Instagram story, suggesting she recognised parallels in how they each shared their “mess” online.
These viral instances of celebrity mess don’t happen in a vacuum. The case of Brooklyn Beckham is connected to the internet’s never-ending obsession with “nepo babies”, the children of famous people who are often seen to be benefiting from their fame and wealth, and who are frequently maligned in times of rising inequality. Add to this the recent Netflix documentaries that reintroduced the Beckhams to gen-Z audiences, and the conditions for virality were already in place.
This passion for mess that doesn’t involve us personally marks a shift from the polished, “brand safe” aesthetic of Millennial social media. We’re in the era of “goblin mode” (the rejection of social norms through behaviour that is unapologetically unpolished), in a climate of disillusion with an “always on” life.
Traditional social media platforms and dating apps alike are losing subscribers and users to hobby apps. Audiences crave reality, imperfection and mess – all more relatable than marketing.
In times of rising inequality, schadenfreude can feel like guilt-free entertainment. But this shift also carries serious emotional and legal implications for those caught in the viral spotlight.
The dark side of the (viral) public eye
In my work on online abuse against people in the public eye, I found that mainstream media narratives about public figures were often repeated, amplified and reworked by trolls, gaining a new lease of life online. When thousands of users participate in reinforcing these narratives, the experience can feel indistinguishable from harassment for those targeted.
So think before you share: is the post you’re amplifying playful or is it made to hurt the person at the centre of it? Is it factual, or can it contribute to creating damaging narratives?
This matters not only because speculation can worsen a public figure’s mental health, but because it can also have consequences for those who post. When online commentary veers into allegedly unsubstantiated claims or questionable opinions, posters may expose themselves to defamation risks, particularly when the subject has the means to pursue legal action, as Justin and Hailey Bieber have previously done.
If the start of 2026 is anything to go by, we are in for a turbulent year in politics, on television and online. Audiences’ thirst for messy drama reflects broader uncertainty and fatigue with digital spaces that thrive on comparison, division and commercialisation. Gossip can be cathartic. But the challenge is not whether we enjoy mess, but whether we can do so without turning real people into collateral damage.
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Carolina Are does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.