Simon And Clemmie Hooper: Everything You Need To Know About The Mother And Father Of Daughters’ Instagram Scandal

Simon has returned to Instagram after 140 days...

Simon and Clemmie Hooper, aka Mother of Daughters and Father of Daughers

Updated on22nd September 2023 at 2.51pm

Midwife and ‘mumfluencer’ Clemmie Hooper, aka Mother Of Daughters, sparked the mother of all scandals back in 2020 by admitting to using an account on gossip forum Tattle.life to secretly troll fellow mummy bloggers. But what happened next?

What did Clemmie Hooper do? And what's it got to do with Tattle Life?

Clemmie - who also shares women's birth stories via her Gas & Air blog - admitted to posting negative comments about other parenting influencers – even her own husband, Simon (aka Father Of Daughters, who she called a 'class-A twat') – after getting sucked into reading nasty threads about her family on the forum, TattleLife. Clemmie said she began commenting under the pseudonym Alice in Wanderlust because she believed ‘Maybe I could change their opinions from the inside to defend my family and I’. However, she soon started using the platform to criticise other influencers and writers, including Cash Carraway and Candice Brathwaite.

Other users started noticing that Alice’s geo-tag often matched the locations where Clemmie was sharing photographs of her family on Instagram, and that, she says, was when she started trying to cover it up. ‘It became all-consuming and it grew bigger than I knew how to handle,’ she wrote online when the news broke. ‘When users started to suspect it was me, I made the mistake of commenting about others. I regret it all and am deeply sorry.’

First, Clemmie, 35, deactivated her Mother Of Daughters Instagram account. A few days later, the account reappeared without any updates. She then closed the account. The account remains closed. There have also been no updates since on her midwife Instagram account, Gas & Air.

Meanwhile, Simon, 37, aka Father of Daughters on Insta, appeared to be playing the situation differently. When the story broke, he said he’d had no idea what Clemmie had been doing and posted that he was ‘angry and a bit sad’ about it. He then continued to share pictures of their cherubic twin daughters, before flying to the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix with a friend, using the journey to promote Etihad Airways. Once there, he declared ‘life doesn’t get much better’ as he posted pictures of Lewis Hamilton and one in which Geri Horner could be spotted standing nearby.

No mention was made of his wife – a fact that did not escape the attention of the ever-watchful members of Tattle.life. The vitriol towards the mother-of-four only intensified, but much of the Tattlers’ criticism was directed at Simon, for what was deemed insensitive behaviour.

So what’s really going on with the Hoopers? One insider tells Grazia she believes their actions are part of a carefully planned strategy. ‘Simon is a management consultant with a good salary, while Clemmie works one day a week as a midwife,’ says the source. ‘But what they earn from their careers doesn’t compare to the sums they make in endorsement deals. Simon will have tens of thousands of pounds’ worth of deal he has to make good on so, together, I think they’ve decided he needs to keep things ticking over on Instagram.’

Sara McCorquodale, author of Influence: How Social Media Influencers Are Shaping Our Digital Future, agrees. ‘They’ve created this brand together and they don’t want to lose that revenue,’ she says. ‘Simon’s Instagram following remains at more than one million, which is interesting – she’s been trolled mercilessly for a long time, while he’s adored. That’s the difference between a woman talking about her children online and a man.’

Brands Clemmie worked with, including jeweller Rachel Jackson, have distanced themselves from her, and the Nursing & Midwifery Council has faced calls to censure her over offensive and racist posts while posing as AliceInWanderLust. At the time, Marks & Spencer issued a statement on Twitter in response to a question about Clemmie’s future with the brand, writing: ‘Clemmie Hooper was included within our autumn campaign among a roster of diverse women. The autumn campaign has now come to an end, as we move into the winter season. Clemmie doesn’t feature in our winter campaign.’

What happened with Clemmie Hooper and Candice Brathwaite?

Black mumfluencer Candice Brathwaite had been on Clemmie's podcast, Birth Stories.

It was revealed that on Tattle.Life, 'Alice' had accused Candice of being ‘aggressive’ and of using her ‘race as a weapon’. Her comments saw her accused of perpetuating racist stereotypes, prompting calls from fellow influencer Kelichi Okafor and many others that her future as a practising midwife be called into question by the NHS.

Candice spoke about the effect of the Tattle Life scandal on the Grazia Life Advice podcast.

Who is Clemmie Hooper?

Hooper, 33, from Kent, was a hugely successful Instagrammer, midwife and mother of four daughters, who had more than 672k followers, celebrity friends and a string of high-profile endorsement deals (from books to clothing companies). Her husband Simon, who also blogs under @father_of_daughters and has a million followers. It’s wasn't the first time Clemmie had been caught in controversy – in May 2018, she become embroiled in a Mumsnet row when some users accused her of exploiting her children for gain – and she left Instagram for a month, making news headlines for doing so.

What happened with Simon Hooper, aka Father Of Daughters, and AXA?

Just months after Clemmie's Tattle Life scandal died down, her husband, Simon, was embroiled in his own Instagram problem.

On International Women's Day in 2020, Simon Hooper fronted a message from AXA about wanting his four daughters to feel as if they are equal and empowered.

Critics said that getting a man to front an International Women's Day campaign was wrong. Simon later apologised, saying: 'A mistake, an error of judgement, a poor decision - however you want to describe it, I made it and now I want to own it.' He then left Instagram but has just returned, saying:

'I went on a little break, that turned into a long break. 140 days to be precise. While I've been away I've had a lot of time to reflect. I was reflecting on my time on here. Like most people I have made some mistakes, I've made content that hasn't landed in the way it was intended. For that I apologise. I hope we can move forward from that.

While I would find the break from social media refreshing, I have missed the creative side. I've missed that. I've missed interacting with people on here.'

Have Clemmie and Simon Hooper got an interiors account?

Yes, it's called House of Hooper. The account is believed to have been active since the beginning of March, but was private at first. The bio of the account reads, ‘Making a House a Family Home: Interiors, design and home renovation from @father_of_daughters’. It has more than 80,000 followers.

Will Clemmie Hooper return to Instagram?

Clemmie has appeared in some of Simon's Instagram posts since the scandal hit.

But what about her own account? Sara said: ‘Social media loves a redemption. I wouldn’t be surprised if she came back sometime early next year. Remember, she still has a large audience who are invested in her story – she could end up commanding even more money.’ Watch this space..