Kristen Bell and Dax Shepard get a lot of much-deserved flack for telling so many personal and potentially embarrassing stories about their kids. We heard about their daughter getting pinworms at preschool, about the time that their daughters walked in on them while they were getting busy, and they just told Ellen about their older daughter asking where babies come from. They protect their daughter’s identities by not showing them on social media and they spearheaded the no kids movement, which led to new laws protecting children and families from paparazzi. So they’re received criticism for talking out of both sides of their mouth basically.
As we heard last week, they have a new organic baby product line at Walmart that’s in direct competition with Jessica Alba’s honest products. It’s called Hello Bello. As I mentioned in our last story about them, the ads feature other people babies as they shield their daughters from the media. In an ad for their diapers, they featured a baby and Kristen saying, “this is Jordan, Jordan sh-ts her pants.”
Someone commented that Kristen is “exploiting other people’s kids for monetary gain” and she explained it sort-of well.
”So your kids deserve privacy but you don’t mind exploiting other people’s children for monetary gain?” – Commenter
“Well, there’s a big difference. If we expose our kids faces, there is a real threat of them getting stalked, or of a stranger coming up to them and knowing their name. It’s a safety thing. I don’t fault other parents for showing their kids when they don’t access (sic) they have the same safety concerns. And Jordan is not the little girl’s real name, FYI.” – Kristen
Halle Berry said that a stranger once recognized her daughter in public without seeing her first and it freaked her out. I understand Dax and Kristen protecting their kids, but they made such a big deal out of it and now they’ve got a kids line at Walmart. Plus it’s not like we’re not hearing about their kids at all. But Kristen’s explanation makes sense, I wouldn’t want my kids to be kidnap targets either. None of that makes Kristen and Dax less annoying, but I get why they protect their kids like this.
Here’s one of their ads. They’re hustlers, they hustle for money and coverage and they do it well.
How is this any different from any other commercial that uses child actors? Some parents (or children) are actively seeking a career/spotlight. It’s not like she claimed these kids were hers.
Yeah, really not seeing cause for outrage here either, tbh.
that was my thought as well. those kids parents are fine with it. their parents aren’t famous, so those kids likely aren’t going to be stalked by paparazzi or weirdo fans.
and telling funny anecdotes about your kids is not the same as putting their face out there for everyone to see. Ali Wong’s sets are primarily about her pregnancies, relationship, and being a mom, but she doesn’t show her kids faces on social media and I don’t see anyone giving her flak for it?
Yeah, I don’t understand how this is supposed to be problematic in any way. If she had lied about that being her kid I get it, but she didn’t. This is just another ad for baby products, it just happens to feature Kristen Bell in it.
Yep. Very silly outrage.
One of the children used in the ad campaign is the son of their friends. The friend posted his ad image on her social media. The ad was a giant billboard in Times Square. These same friends post pictures on their social media often of them hanging with the Bell-Shepard clan. They go to the dunes together, they vacation together, they celebrate holidays together, they roller together, they take pictures together. So, this couple and their kids hang with Dax and Kristen and their kids. They post pictures of that happening, but Kristen doesn’t mind if that information is shown on social media. It’s just so long as it doesn’t show up on Kristen’s social media.
I enjoy the stories about their family. They seem like they are who they present themselves as being. I like em
“They seem like they are who they present themselves as being.”
Yeah, this is exactly why I like them. I think they overshare stories and I find them kinda annoying, but I don’t feel like they are putting that as a facade. And I appreciate that in celebs.
I love Kristen Bell in the The Good Place so much! She’s a great actress.
What I don’t get, is that she claims to be so socially conscious of human and environmental rights, but she’s a spokesperson for Neutrogena which is well known for doing animal testing.
Yep. And Walmart is notoriously horrible to their employees and owned by super right wing nutters. I like Kristen Bell as an actress, but she has more to defend than using other people’s children in her ad campaign.
Telling a story about your kids is vastly different they putting their face out there for the world to see.
And I get her point, a kid in a commercial is not going to be stalked by paparazzi, but the kids of celebrities are.
I kind of wish they’d stop doing so many commercials and endorsements though, it’s a bit overkill. And I say that as someone who really likes her as an actress.
But it’s still capitalizing off of her personal life as a mother for professional gain. And that’s the part that is hypocritical. On one hand they are screaming for PRIVACY, on the other they are willing to sell products and hope you buy them based off the knowledge of their private life and image. It’s all a game.
She has that forced-relatability thing going on that I find so offputting. I think the oversharing has really really turned me off from everything with her.
And she seems to have no respect for the dignity of children, either her own or someone else’s. She makes everything about how gross they are and how they don’t know much yet. Lady, that’s part of being a child! To me, obsessing over how gross and in knowledgeable your kid is is not a relatable behavior at all. Ugh. She bugs.
It’s forcing it a bit to call this a controversy. Telling anecdotes about your kids is what all parents do and I don’t see a problem if you run it by them and they say it’s okay to share. If they are too young then keep out anything that might embarrass them later (like potty shots). Use judgment. Those stories don’t bug as much as them talking about their relationship tbh. So that includes the story about the daughter surprising them when they were getting busy.
I don’t like her but she’s completely right here.
Does Jessica Alba use her kids for Honest Brand ads? Where’s the controversy?
I can only think of Kim Kardashian having North “accidentally” putting on her new lip color for Instagram.
Maybe this isn’t popular but I really like her and this seems like manufactured outrage to me. I’m curious about the diapers, actually–I use Honest but they’re not cheap and if Hello Bello are similar (chlorine free etc.) but mess expensive I’ll give them a try with my 10 month old.
Edited to add: they’re sold only at Wal Mart so… Nope. Can’t in good conscience shop there.
I would like someone to clarify to me is if they are actually in competition with The Honest Company or if this is an off-shoot of The Honest Company. Sean Kane founded The Honest Company and he is listed as the founder of Hello Bello. If this is an off-shoot of The Honest Company, it seems like it’s not a new line. This is a reworking of The Honest Company with products at a lower price point so they can get it into Walmart. The thing that is different are the celebrity endorsements.
In an interview when Kristen was asked about why she does so many commercials/ads, she said she would only work with socially responsible companies. Then she partners with Walmart for Hello Bello. She posts on social media about gun control, but Walmart is the largest retailer in the US of gun sales. She says she is pro-union, and Walmart is anti-union. She says she is pro-environment, and Walmart is one of the worst companies for environmental impact.
Sacred heart……you can buy guns at Walmart? Well……blimey. 😳
I came here to rant about how much she bothers me and then I saw Charliepenns comment and that pretty much sums it up!
I’ve said before that I was a big Veronica Mars and Kristen Bell fan at one time, but these two lie constantly. Unfortunately, I don’t think their careers are where they hoped they would be at this time in their lives, so they feel like they continually have to have their names in the news. They do that by saying provocative things (and by name-dropping in interviews).
I could go on and on about the many, many lies these two tell. Let me be a bit more controversial and say one of the main reasons we give these two a pass is because Kristen is a blonde Disney princess who pretends to be the all-American girl with an all-American family, including two blonde children.
I wouldn’t say it’s a controversy, but it is hypocritical. They have kids so they’re SO CONCERNED ABOUT KIDS that they came up with this baby line at Walmart. They were just on Ellen to tell hilarious parent stories. Just because they are right that papparazzi shouldn’t be taking pictures of children or to have stalking/kidnapping concerns, doesn’t mean them using their children to seem cool and fun isn’t also bad.
Exactly.
So they can never do a movie with kids in it? These kids are actors, they are doing a job and getting paid to do it. What is the problem here? How are they being exploited? If you have a problem with children acting in commercials and movies, or even on YouTube, then you should blame the parents.
They use their personal/family life for professional gain. They aren’t the first or the last to do so, but being dogmatic about ‘privacy’ and using your ‘private’ life to shill products is duplicitous.
This ^
I love the French laws. Parents can go to jail and/or be heavily fined for posting their kids’ pics on social media / online, etc. We don’t take this stuff seriously enough.