14 DAY TRIAL // Reality stars Mama June, Sugar Bear, and their daughter Honey Boo Boo, who had their own hit show on TLC, Here Comes Honey Boo Boo, until a few days ago, are putting up a united front for the cameras as the scandal around Mama June’s love life continues.
Mama June, June Shannon’s “stage” name, is now dating the man who served a 10-year prison sentence on charges of molesting her own daughter when she was just 8 years old. Photos have emerged online, confirming the relationship, but June insists that it’s all just a rumor because she would never go back to such a man.
Amid talk that she might lose custody of her 3 minor children, including Alana “Honey Boo Boo” Thompson, who is the daughter of Sugar Bear (real name Mike Thompson), she and Sugar Bear are making one last effort to prove that the scandal isn’t just exaggerated: it simply does not exist.
Mama June, what a tangled web she weaves
Mama June’s love life would make any character from your favorite soap opera feel as if they’ve been missing out in life. It’s always been very complicated, but never before like right now, after confirmation came that she went back to the man who went away to prison as a child abuser, Mark McDaniel.
Despite her initial denial, which she posted on Facebook but has deleted since (you will find it embedded below), photos proved her to be a liar: she didn’t just go back to McDaniel, she went house hunting with him and even bought him a used car, cash down.
Within hours of the story breaking, TLC pulled the plug on the reality show, had the production team pack everything up and leave, and all contact with the matriarch and her family was cut short. A fifth season of the series was supposed to air in January 2015.
At about the same time, buzz started picking up that Sugar Bear, who had split from Mama June some weeks ago (after reports emerged that he might have cheated on her), was meeting with attorneys to discuss his options to extract Honey Boo Boo from a house where, he now knew, a convicted pedophile had free access, and thus remove her from harm’s way.
To make things even more complicated, as Chickadee, Mama June’s adult daughter, McDaniel’s victim, came forward to confirm the abuse, her other daughter, Pumpkin, claimed the scandal was fake, just like the photos proving her mama was in a relationship with the pedophile. Photoshop these days, it can create the most outrageous scenarios, Pumpkin said.
Mama June and Sugar Bear, together again
All signs pointed to the fact that the family wasn’t about to lose everything they had worked for, but that it would be destroyed in the process too. Sugar Bear spoke to the paparazzi just the other day and admitted that he was “extremely upset” and worried about his daughter, now that he knew Mama June, his ex, was seeing a convicted child molester.
As upset and worried as he might have been, he seems to have gotten over it very quickly, because here he is, arm in arm with Mama June and Honey Boo Boo at his side, strolling for the paparazzi in Milledgeville, GA.
TMZ reports that he won’t fight Mama June for custody of Honey Boo Boo, which means that he has no interest in getting on June’s toes because “she controls access to their daughter.” So he must have struck a deal with her, in which he puts up a united front in the hope that this will make the scandal go away.
Even in those cases when celebrities refuse to issue statements or address certain issues in interviews, a staged photo-op remains the most convenient way of making a stand. Not to mention that it also puts some money in their pocket, because this kind of photos goes for top-dollar, especially if the scandal is huge, which is the case here.
Whichever the reason, Mama June and Sugar Bear are together again, and they and Honey Boo Boo want the world to know that, no matter what you read, their world isn’t shattered or in any way shaken by the scandal. Which brings us to the question: could this have been just a PR stunt? Would they be capable of scooping this low for media attention? What do you think?