David Beckham’s daughter and the crazy concerns of total strangers
David Beckham, soccer star to the world, husband of Posh Spice, cool dad and all around great guy, is here to shake the haters off. For some odd reason, his parenting skills have recently come under fire concerning his daughter, Harper. Harper is a pretty cool four year old (remember when she learned to ride a bike? And picked out her dad’s latest tattoo?). But the thing about Harper is that she still uses a pacifier. According to The Daily Mail, she should stop doing this. Because yes, The Daily Mail just told Beckham how to parent his daughter.
The Daily Mail‘s story explains that the Beckhams are “[risking] stunting their daughter’s speech and [are] putting her teeth at risk of damage by letting her continue to use one.” They even consulted a parenting expert on the issue, and she explained that children “are far less likely to speak if [they] have a [pacifier] in [their] mouth,” and continued that “Many dentists will agree that [pacifier] use at this age really is not good.”
While on one hand is, you know, solid advice and stuff. But on the other hand, how about we not tell parents we don’t really know how to parent their children—if they’re generally doing a solid job? Unless we’re sitting with the Beckhams at the dinner table (life dream) we don’t really know what’s going on in their family world, or any number of reasons as to why Harper still occasionally uses a pacifier.
Beckham has taken issue with this Daily Mail story, naturally, and posted a screenshot of the headline to his Instagram. In his caption, he lays out his rebuttal: “Why do people feel they have the right to criticize a parent about their own children without having any facts??” The rest of his caption states that Harper wasn’t feeling well, and when children aren’t feeling well, a parent will do whatever is necessary to sooth them. And that meant Harper got her pacifier, if only for a little while. Because Beckham is taking care of his child as he sees fit, and he’s doing a great job if you ask us.
We hear David loud and clear, and we’re not alone.
As CNN’s Katia Hetter explains, “There isn’t a parent alive today who hasn’t been corrected about their parenting by complete strangers who would never otherwise interfere in an adult’s life…. We parents get criticized for looking at our phones while our children are on the playground or helping too much while our children are on the playground, not dressing them warmly enough or dressing them too warmly, asking people to be quiet when they nap or letting them nap too long, or not forcing them to hug people they don’t want to hug (my personal favorite). The list is endless, and people seem to think they have the right to comment anytime.”
So always remember that the haters are going to hate, hate, hate. And it’s best to just shake them off (shake it off). Which is exactly what Beckham has done. Now he’s gotta get back to being a great dad, OK?
(Image via Instagram)
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