Mom Criticized For Posting Daughter’s Traumatized Response To Being Forcibly Taken To Visit Her Dad
Is she raising awareness or exploiting her child?
TikTok A mom's TikTok account which documents her young daughter fighting off court-ordered visits to her father’s house has attracted a lot of attention on the app with videos reaching nearly 17 to 18 million views.
The heartbreaking videos show the young girl seemingly reacting to trauma suffered during her previous visits to her father.
There is no major context or evidence of the alleged abuse but the distressing videos show the child's visceral response to having to see her father and paternal grandparents.
The child fights off her grandma and father at a court-ordered visitation.
Under the account name “@courtsanctionchildabuse,” the child's mother has posted several videos that show two separate instances of her daughter’s reaction to having to visit her father.
The first instance involves the little girl struggling to remain seated in the car as her biological father, his mother and his father all try to get her out.
“I don’t wanna go,” she screams and cries as the grandmother tries to play nice with her and convince her to willingly get out of the vehicle.
“You’re supposed to encourage her, that’s what the judge said,” the grandmother tells the biological mother who is recording the incident.
The mother claims that she doesn’t have to do anything and that she’s not allowed to touch her in this situation, continuing to record the struggle that her daughter is in.
“Tara what have you done to her?” asks the grandmother after she proves to be unsuccessful in her attempts to get the child, Hailey, to get out of the car.
“This is terrible, you’re her mother, this is her father. He has every right to see her.”
When Hailey’s biological father appears, she claims that he isn’t really her father, adding that he’s “telling a lie” and “faking” as she pinches the skin around her legs.
The father and grandmother ask her who told her to say that, trying to claim that the mother coached her into saying those things, but she screams that “nobody” told her to.
In the second part of the video, the grandmother gets more forceful in pulling Hailey out of the car and insults Tara.
“You’re a terrible mother,” she says. “You have to encourage your child to come with us.”
The comments are divided on who to believe is in the right here.
“I really hope this isn't coached,” one user wrote in the comments. “Some of the things she said [seem] a little put in her head... and the way she instantly stopped.”
Some people believe that Tara may be telling Hailey what to say in order to win some sort of custody suit or just to turn the daughter on her father.
Another user retorts, “For everyone saying the kid was being coached. Look at the grandparents they are the ones saying horrible things. That's coaching.”
Many people pointed out that the biological father was laughing at Hailey as she kicked, cried, and screamed.
“We need a background story. This little girl does not want to go with them. Is there trauma? What’s going on here,” wrote a third.
In another video, the daughter claims that she doesn’t feel safe around them, but many people noted how well it seemed she articulated her words and claimed that she was coached to say them.
One woman doesn’t think that the mother should have posted anything at all.
A woman named Sarah under the TikTok account @mom.uncharted believes that Tara shouldn’t have posted anything at all.
“The fact that a mother thinks this is okay to post publicly on social media is enraging to me,” she said. “If you need to film this for your lawyer for court purposes, you go ahead, that is within your right.”
Sarah claims that the problem arises when it’s being done for attention or views or likes.
Others pointed out that if Tara’s intentions were truly pure, she might have posted ways for the public to get involved or help them, but she hasn’t
In a separate video, she addresses comments on the original that claimed she might have posted the videos to raise awareness and because the court system failed her.
“That might be the case. We do not know because we have no context in regard to these videos that are now circulating,” she said.
Regardless, she says she doesn’t believe that a child’s trauma and distress should be posted publicly without their knowledge and consent.
Tara has posted a video giving some background information on the situation but doesn’t provide evidence in the form of court documents or anything of the sort.
The original videos have all been removed from TikTok. The only one remains is ths story of the coparenting situation this obviously traumatized young child has been growing up in.
Isaac Serna-Diez is an Assistant Editor who focuses on entertainment and news, social justice, and politics. Keep up with his rants about current events on his Twitter.