Brooklyn Beckham, the eldest son of Victoria Beckham and David Beckham, recently accused his mother of behaving “very inappropriately” during his wedding to Nicola Peltz, claiming she “hijacked” the couple’s first dance and crossed a line in front of guests.
The allegation has taken on a life of its own online, with people desperately looking for evidence and taking sides in the controversial family rift.
Highlights
- A groom shared footage of his own mother’s wedding dance to push back on criticism of Victoria Beckham.
- The TikTok video surpassed 26 million views and triggered debate over how mothers should behave at weddings.
- The groom revealed his mother had lost her longtime partner and his grandmother prior to the dance.
As debate over the Beckhams intensified, one groom unexpectedly stepped into the conversation with evidence of what a mother enthusiastically dancing at her child’s wedding can actually look like.
“In Victoria Beckham’s defense, this was my mom at our wedding,” he wrote.
A mother’s wild dance at her son’s wedding went viral amid Victoria Beckham’s family fallout
Image credits: itsjackandjoseph/TikTok
36-year-old Joseph Maine went viral after posting a clip from his June wedding to husband Jack McWilliams on TikTok, which showed her mother, Julie Maine, dancing in a suggestive fashion with one of his friends.
Image credits: itsjackandjoseph/TikTok
The video shows the 55-year-old being picked up and bounced in the air by 40-year-old Travis Kipp while a remix of Charli XCX’s I Love It plays in the background.
Under a shimmering disco ball, Julie is seen throwing both arms into the air as guests cheer her on before being set back down moments later.
Image credits: itsjackandjoseph/TikTok
“She asked our friend to pick her up,” Joseph wrote. “Let moms live. They need to shake it sometimes too!”
The clip went viral almost instantly, surpassing 26 million views since being posted last Friday (January 23), along with 1.6 million likes, 136,000 shares, 56,000 saves, and roughly 18,000 comments.
In an interview with People Magazine, Joseph took a moment to specifically defend Victoria Beckham from the, in his view, unjustified amount of vitriol and criticism levied at her after Brooklyn’s exposé.
“There has been so much discourse online and pearl clutching about a single sentence written about Victoria Beckham at her son’s wedding with zero context or evidence,” Joseph said.
“I knew if people could be that rocked by something they’ve never seen, this would really have them shaking in their boots.”
While many netizens congratulated Joseph’s mother, others felt sharing the clip was in bad taste
Image credits: victoriabeckham/Instagram
“I’ve never been so uncomfortable,” a comment read. “Why the hell were you all okay with this?”
The intensity of the backlash surprised Joseph.
“I just never imagined people would not be able to see the humor, not understand the text on screen was a joke or that people would not read the caption and think I was the one holding her,” he said.
“There’s so many expectations for how a mom is ‘supposed to act.’ Had this not been my mom and a friend who was 15 years younger, the reaction would have been dismal in comparison.”
Image credits: Vogue
While Joseph and Julie have largely laughed at the scale of the clip’s reach, the negativity left a sour taste in their mouths.
“My mom mentioned how disappointing it is to see that the most judgmental people in the comments are other women and mothers,” Joseph said.
“She hopes that they can let go of their internal shame and not be so quick to jump to conclusions, as many of the comments were more vulgar than anything happening in the video.”
Julie had endured a devastating year leading up to the wedding as her boyfriend of eight years had passed away one year earlier
The family had also lost Joseph’s grandmother.
“She had a rough year leading up to the wedding, losing her partner and my grandmother both,” Joseph said.
“I was just happy to see her smiling and having fun. We were laughing about it for weeks. All those crazy moments over a four-day wedding are the stories we will retell for years to come. Life’s too short to be boring.”
Joseph said his mother “had the time of her life” and even worried afterward that she might have embarrassed him.
“What people didn’t see was that she was saying ‘put me down!’ at the end,” he said.
“Afterward, she came running up to me to ask if she had embarrassed me and apologized if she had gotten carried away, but there was no need for an apology.”
Image credits: itsjackandjoseph/TikTok
Moreover, Julie said she was surprised by the amount of mothers who saw the video and came to her defense.
“She loved seeing the women that enjoyed it and saw themselves in her,” Joseph added.
“She recognizes that there’s also a group online that understands the importance for mothers to be able to celebrate in their own way after successfully raising children.”
"Release the Beckham files." Netizens argued over the appropriateness of the clip
