Candace Cameron Bure decided to celebrate the new year by sharing a recent family photo on social media. But when the star read some of the comments that followed, she lost that festive feeling.
Over the weekend, she took the “haters” to task.
“I posted my family Christmas photo and sadly, there were so many unkind comments,” she wrote in a Facebook post. “Do you think it’s funny to criticize someone’s children? To make jokes about them? To critique our poses? The direction in which we are looking? Our physical appearance and facial expressions? I wished blessings upon everyone as I shared it in the spirit of a happy new year, yet so many of you came back with jokes about our appearance and criticism of what you thought would have been a better photo.”
The photo in question, taken by photographer Melissa Coulier (who’s married to Bure’s former “Full House” co-star Dave Coulier), was shared on Instagram and showed Bure posing alongside husband Valeri and their three children, daughter Natasha, 22, and sons Lev, 20, and Maksim, 18. But it wasn’t exactly a typical holiday pic with a Christmas tree and matching pajamas. Instead, the pro shot showed the family standing behind a house, looking in different directions and offering up very different expressions.
Complimentary commenters compared the polished pic to a country music album cover, and several said it could pass for a Ralph Lauren ad. But then there were the other commenters, those who picked apart the photo.
“This is a very weird photo,” wrote one person, who went on to say one of Bure’s sons “looks stoned,” that her daughter “looks like a Disney movie evil queen” and she’d “fire the photographer” based on the image.
The actor’s daughter offered her own comment in response to that sentiment on Instagram, too, writing, “Oh, my god, I didn’t smile or look at the camera. Sue me!!!”
“Shame on you,” Bure continued in her Facebook post, taking aim at the negativity. “It doesn’t matter if you’re 10 or 90 years old, rude is rude. Be better than that. I’m praying for humanity. Manners and respect. If you don’t like something, just move on. There are people and real feelings behind every screen.”
She added a postscript that read, “Please don’t tell me to ignore the “haters.” There were plenty of well meaning people who thought it would be funny to point out things and share their commentary, ‘with love.’ Umm... that’s not love. That’s rude. Try kind. It looks good on everyone.”
That Facebook post has raked more than 57,000 replies since it went up, overwhelmingly positive replies heaping praise on the actor, her family and the photo.