Show business can cause a rift between families that lasts a long time. The kind of bitterness that arises from jealousy is usually so ugly and awkward that celebrities go to great lengths keeping it from the spotlight. Most of these situations come from parents being involved in the management of the celebrity's career, and if that goes south, everyone can come out looking bad. Here's a list of stars who chose to throw their parents overboard instead of going down with the ship.
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#1 LINDSAY LOHAN
Tabloid stories about the Lohans waging war appear more often than Elvis and Tupac's secret island. While Michael and Dina Lohan would never win any Parent of the Year awards, Lindsay herself isn't exactly a model daughter. Her well-documented spiral out of control was punctuated with "intervention" attempts by both parents, which Lindsay repeatedly rebuffed by attacking her father for being abusive to her mother, while her mother was abusing herself (with drugs and alcohol). It was all thinly-veiled, high drama nonsense aimed specifically at keeping themselves in the press. Lindsay's new narrative, which she sold to Oprah, goes like this: "I hate the bad rap [my parents] get. They're just parents, at the end of the day. I don't blame anyone for my mistakes." We're thinking this load of crap will probably last about as long as her movie career did.
#2 MACAULAY CULKIN
It's tough to express your displeasure with someone more than to legally declare "I no longer want to be associated with you in any way." And that's exactly what Macaulay Culkin did when he filed for and won emancipation from his parents. Granted, at the time Christopher 'Kit' Culkin and Patricia Brentrup were in the middle of an ugly custody battle that was starting to look more and more like a money grab for Macaulay's earnings. Much has been said about Kit Culkinwho was undoubtedly responsible for driving Macaulay's film careerranging from the worst insults to, "Eh, he was a guy trying to do right for his kid in a cutthroat business." Ultimately, Macaulay turned his back on both parents for good, choosing a new father figure in Michael Jackson, which is a bigger gut-kick than any lawsuit could ever deliver.
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#3 AMANDA BYNES
As a teenager, Amanda Bynes almost went the Culkin route, filing for emancipation from her parents, but she ultimately withdrew the petition. Soon after, during a lengthy public meltdown that included several arrests, Amanda started lashing out at her parents directly, going so far as to accuse her father of sexual abuse. She eventually withdrew this accusation as well, but through everything her parents seemed supportive and genuinely concerned with her best interests. Finally getting Amanda into a psychiatric treatment program, her parents remain in her life, but it's probably only a matter of time before she'll go off the rails and throw them under the bus again.
#4 THE KARDASHIANS
This one isn't a blood feud, but it sheds some light on exactly how greedy Khloe, Kourtney, Kim Kardashian, and their mother, Kris Jenner, can be. After Robert Kardashian's death, his then-wife, Ellen Pearson, may have sold some of his old family photos to a tabloid. Sensing the opportunity to lose that what surely was a tiny profit for themselves, the clan swooped into action and filed a copyright infringement lawsuit. If anyone was going to brand and subsequently pimp out their family albums, it was going to be them, not their stepmotheralso known as "the woman who sat by their father's side while he died of cancer."
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#5 KOBE BRYANT
Kobe Bryant also took his parents to court. Did they sell stories about him to the tabloids? Did they borrow money from him and never pay it back? No, they did something far worse. They tried to sell his old high school jerseys and some other sports memorabilia in order to finance a Vegas home purchase. Yep, the basketball superstar with a net worth north of a quarter billion dollars sued his parents and made them publicly apologize over a box of his crap in their basement. It sounds like every kid's dreammaking their parents admit they were wrong. But by taking the position of the millionaire who still wants more, Kobe just looks like a brat.
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#6 MIKE "THE SITUATION" SORRENTINO
The Jersey Shore star whose abs and personality share the same nickname sued his father over copyright infringement after Frank "I Was Responsible For Creating A Garbage Person" Sorrentino created a website dedicated to badmouthing his own son. This whole circumstance is the truest example of the apple not falling far from the rotten tree. We only hope the lawsuit financially wiped out all parties involved and the Sorrentino family can disappear from our collective consciousness altogether.
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#7 EMINEM
Probably the ultimate posterchild for the "I Hate My Parents Club," Marshall "Eminem" Mathers wrote entire albums dedicated to trashing his mom, Debbie Nelson. Claiming she was an abusive, neglectful drug addict his whole life, Eminem held nothing back when it came time for his revenge in songs like, "Kill You." It leaves little to the imagination about his true feelings. He also set his sights on his ex-wife, Kim, penning multiple dark and twisted songs in which she is either dead, or he kills her. So, maybe he has some issues with women?
After all, Debbie says her own childhood was no picnic, suffering abuse at the hands of her own parents and husband, leading her on the path to addiction. We're not saying she was even close to being June Cleaver, but maybe Eminem didn't have to treat her like she was Carrie's mom. To be fair, he actually did release the track "Headlights," his mea culpa to his mother, but we're not sure anything is ever going to erase lyrics like "I'ma pull you to this bullet, and put it through you!" That one probably made for an awkward Thanksgiving.
