9 Celebrities Who Were Called Out Publicly By Their Own Children

These famous offspring have gone as far as to publicly call out their parents, sharing how they really feel about them. While it marked the end of some of their relationships, a few of these parents and children were actually able to reconcile.

Find out what these celebrity children had to say about their parents ...

1. Rob Schneider

Rob Schneider wasn’t very close with his daughter Elle King when she was growing up. She recently opened up about his “toxic” parenting and called him out for not being a present father during her childhood.

Looking back, Elle says Rob sent her to fat camp on multiple occasions and when she didn’t lose weight one summer because she was injured, he punished her. When she did visit him on movie sets, she said he would scream at her if she accidentally got in the way. And when she started to get tattoos, she said he forced her to cover up in sweaters, even when it was 108 degrees.

“My dad forgot about every single birthday. I spent my 18th birthday in a summer school and they brought me cupcakes and I came home and my dad forgot my birthday,” Elle shared on the Dumb Blonde podcast. “He’s just not nice…You can want someone to change so much. You can’t control anyone else’s actions and you can’t control people’s feelings. All you can control is how you react and what you do with your feelings.”

In response, Rob issued a public apology to Elle during an interview with Tucker Carlson, saying that he wished he was “the father in [his] 20s that she needed” and hoped that she could “forgive [him] for [his] shortcomings.”

2. Shanna Moakler

Travis Barker’s children, Landon and Alabama Barker, have had a rocky relationship with their mom Shanna Moakler for years. In 2021, both Landon and Alabama called out their mom for not being present in their lives. In one post, Landon responded to a follower who accused him of “taking sides” in his parents’ divorce.

“Actually if you weren’t such a dumba-- you would realize our mom has never been in our lives and isn’t there for us like our dad is,” Landon wrote.

Then, Alabama responded to an Instagram story where Shanna said that Travis purposely tried to alienate their kids from her. On her own account, Alabama wrote, “My mom has never completely been in my life, can you guys stop painting her out to be an amazing mom.”

Following the allegations, Shanna told People that the “claims of being absent” from her children’s lives were “false and incredibly hurtful.” Several years later, Shanna shared that both her children had “taken back what they said about [her] and apologized."

3. Billy Ray Cyrus

Billy Ray Cyrus has seemingly had many ups and downs in his relationship with his daughter Miley Cyrus, dating all the way back to 2013. Back when Miley’s mother Trish filed for divorce for the first time, Miley called out her dad, seemingly accusing him of cheating.

In a quickly-deleted tweet, Miley allegedly posted a photo of Billy Ray’s and one of his Chicago costars and reportedly wrote, “Since you won’t reply to my texts, I’m giving you an hour to tell the truth, or I’ll tell it for you.” After the tweet was deleted, Billy Ray did not speak out.

Since then, there’s been more highs and lows, including drama with Billy Ray and his recent ex Firerose. While Miley recently said she’s not estranged from her father, she did joke that he was a narcissist and she inherited it from him.

4. Bill Hudson

Bill Hudson is dad to both Oliver and Kate Hudson but the family has had a rocky relationship. In 2015, Olivia dedicated a Father’s Day post to Bill, calling him out for deserting the family, writing, “Happy Abandonment Day!” Bill didn’t take too kindly to the post and went on to share that he no longer considered Oliver and Kate his children -- despite the fact that Kate wasn’t involved.

“I had five birth children but I now consider myself a father of three. I no longer recognize Oliver and Kate as my own. I would ask them to stop using the Hudson name,” Bill told The Daily Mail. “They are no longer a part of my life. Oliver’s Instagram post was a malicious, vicious, premeditated attack. He is dead to me now. As is Kate. I am mourning their loss even though they are still walking this earth.”

While it was an intense statement, the family has continued to work through their issues over the years and Kate says they are now “warming up” to each other.

5. Elon Musk

Elon Musk’s daughter Vivian Wilson recently made headlines when the Telsa founder claimed that Vivian had “tricked” him into authorizing transgender-related medical treatment for her when she was 16. Elon also said that Vivian was “not a girl” and was figuratively “dead, killed by the woke mind virus.”

While Vivian has largely remained out of the spotlight, she spoke out for the first time to call out Elon, claiming that he wasn’t a supportive father throughout her life and had largely been absent from her adolescence. Looking back, she says he was only around 10% of the time.

“He was cold. He’s very quick to anger. He is uncaring and narcissistic,” she told NBC News, adding that Elon would harass her for exhibiting feminine traits as a child and pressured her to appear and sound more masculine. “I was in fourth grade. We went on this road trip … and he was constantly yelling at me viciously because my voice was too high. It was cruel.”

Vivian has not spoken to her father for the past four years and says she’d like her life to be “defined by [her] own choices” instead of his.

6. Ewan McGregor

Ewan McGregor’s daughter Clara McGregor didn’t seem too happy with her father after he split from her mother Eve Mavrakis and then quickly began dating his Fargo co-star Mary Elizabeth Winstead. Clara put her dad and Mary on blast by commenting on a photo of the actress shared on a fan account.

“Most beautiful and talented woman on earth? Oh man y’all are delusional. The girl is a piece of trash x,” Clara commented on the photo.

While Clara publicly shared her disapproval of her father’s new relationship, she later admitted that it wasn’t the best way to deal with things. She apologized, sharing, “It wasn’t the most mature way to go about things, but I was angry and upset.”

7. Tom Hanks

Chet Hanks has had some ups and downs with his parents, Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson. In a now-deleted YouTube video discussing life growing up with a famous​ mom and dad, Chet said he was bullied and didn’t have a strong male role model to support him -- seemingly calling out his father.

“I didn’t have a strong male role model to tell me, ‘Bro, f--k these people. They’re just jealous of you. You have all these things that they want, so they’re trying to f--king throw their shade at you so you can feel s---ty about yourself because they’re jealous,’” Chet said in the video.

He continued, “I needed to hear that. I didn’t have anyone to tell me that. This is me now telling the younger version of myself what I needed to hear then.”

Chet explained that his anger and insecurity caused him to act out through partying, drugs and other substance abuse. While he appeared to diss his father in the video, Chet shared that he had changed his life and is now on a better path.

8. Russell Simmons

In 2023, Russell Simmons found himself in the middle of some major drama with his daughters Ming Lee Simmons and Aoki Lee Simmons. It started when Ming posted a Father’s Day tribute to her mom, which subtly shaded Russell. Russell responded by saying that Kimora had been the cause of his strained relationship with his daughters -- to which Aoki clapped back with receipts, documenting her father’s alleged toxic behavior.

“My father is not well, for years, he needs help and won’t accept that he refuses to acknowledge he is not himself,” Aoki captioned a now-deleted video. “He has threatened and bullied my sister, my grandma, he has harassed my grandma in the middle of the night in poor health, [and sent] a man to my sister’s apartment at 2 a.m. to scare her. He lashes out at ANYONE who does not say, ‘Ooh Russell everything is fine.’ Well it’s not fine.”

Aoki went on to say that her father’s personality change had been very sudden and for years prior, they were incredibly close. Their mother Kimora also got involved, saying that Russell had threatened their daughters, financially cut them off and refused to pay for Aoki’s therapy.

Shortly after, Russell issued an apology on his Instagram story. In the wake of the drama, Aoki said she didn’t regret calling out her father and the pair are now seemingly on better terms.

9. Herschel Walker

Herschel Walker’s son, former right-wing influencer Christian Walker, was seemingly once a big supporter of his father and his political ambitions. But that changed when allegations against his father came to light. Amid Herschel’s campaign to become a senator, a woman came forward claiming that he had gotten her pregnant and then paid for her to get an abortion -- actions that directly opposed Herschel’s anti-abortion platform.

Christian later told Buzzfeed News that his relationship with his father had been deteriorating throughout his campaign, particularly because none of his family had wanted him to run in the first place. Christian and other family members knew about Herschel’s troubled past and believed that the campaign would end up airing out their long kept secrets. When the abortion story came to light, it was the final straw for Christian who took to social media to call out his dad.

“I don’t care about someone who has a bad past and takes accountability. But how DARE YOU LIE and act as though you’re some ‘moral, Christian, upright man.’ You’ve lived a life of DESTROYING other peoples lives. How dare you,” Christian Walker wrote in a series of now-deleted tweets.

He continued, “Every family member of Herschel Walker asked him not to run for office, because we all knew (some of) his past. Every single one. He decided to give us the middle finger and air out all of his dirty laundry in public, while simultaneously lying about it.”

Following the messages, Herschel ended up losing the election and Christian took a step back from his father’s life. It’s unclear if the pair have since reconciled.