By Phoebe Hoffman
This article discusses topics that might be sensitive to some audiences.
In my freshman year of college, I would sometimes stay up late with my friend listening to people reading Reddit stories about bad parents. On occasion, we would talk about true crime cases together. We always came to the same conclusion: every kid deserves a parent, but not every parent deserves a kid.
Unfortunately, this will probably be true for the rest of time, and one of the most notorious examples of this is the tragic 2008 case of Caylee Anthony, the three year old daughter of Casey Anthony who was allegedly murdered by her mother. One of the most notable aspects of this case was the fact that Anthony lied about her young daughter being missing, and did not contact the police for 31 days.
Anthony was found guilty on four counts of giving false information to law enforcement, although two of those counts were later overturned and she did not seem to care about the fact that her daughter was missing for nearly a month.
Despite the evidence against her, Anthony has been free for several years. A high-profile criminal defense lawyer, Jose Baez, represented Anthony, directing her to accuse her father of not only murdering her daughter, but also of sexual abuse. Due to Anthony’s actions and the evidence against her, many people across the world view the 39-year old as a vile human being, yet 14 years after the trial, she attempts, once again, to rebrand herself by making a post on TikTok stating that she wants to make things clear, as a “legal advocate” and a “researcher,” claiming that she’s “been in the legal field since 2011.”
In the past, she has tried to reclaim her image by producing a show with Peacock, a streaming service, titled “Casey Anthony: Where the Truth Lies.” Earlier this month, she joined TikTok to “advocate for myself and for my daughter,” she said.
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The concept of redemption through the internet ties back to the topic of “cancel culture”, a term coined in 2018 which is used to describe the process of a public figure, or celebrity, getting called out, or even harassed, for deplorable acts they have committed.
In earlier days, cancel culture was, and to an extent, still is known for having a horrible effect on celebrities. However, in more recent years, people who have been “cancelled” have been able to make a return into the realm of fame by apologizing in a genuine manner by acknowledging what they did wrong and making a change in their actions. Others will take the route of simply acting like nothing ever happened.
It seems like Casey Anthoby will opt to pursue the latter route, seeing as she acknowledges some supposed care for her daughter by saying “…I’ve been in the legal field since 2011, and in this capacity I feel that its necessary that if I’m going to continue to operate appropriately as a legal advocate that I start to advocate for myself and also advocate for my daughter.”
The strong dislike that Anthony has received from the public is due to the fact that she not only failed to report her daughter’s 31 day absence – it was her own mother who called the police in a state of distress – but also because she was known to have lied several times during the investigation. One instance of this was Anthony’s dishonest claim about her daughter being kidnapped by a babysitter named “Zenaida ‘Zanny’ Fernandez-Gonzales”, a woman she did not even know and which she admitted was a lie.
Casey states that she’s not going to respond to anything she’s been accused of, nor is she going to respond to anything her family has been accused of, and she opens up an account on Substack , a subscription based platform where creators can publish newsletters directly to their subscribers.
Another video on Casey’s TikTok profile, tagged with “#fypシ゚viral #substack #meta,” plays two screenshots advertising her Substack account: the first screenshot shows the profile page for her account, showing that she reposted a quote from Karl Dunn that reads “The internet is making us hate people we don’t even know. Log off. Go out. Talk to a real person….”
The second screenshot appears to be a message from a subscribers-only chat stating that many accounts regarding her or her case at all are being labeled as what she calls “a ‘boycott account’.” She also states in this message that “people deserve to know what resources they can turn to, and to be reminded that they still have rights.”
Most of the internet has responded to Anthony’s comeback attempt with negativity– many were hopeful that the first video would be her last. I genuinely believe that there is no possibility of Anthony reclaiming her image, not only because of the amount of evidence against her, but also because once you ruin or take innocent life – let alone a life that barely started – you are not the person you were prior to the crime.
What defines a good person lies in the decisions that they make.
Featured image: TikTok / Getty Images
Sources:
Neale, Eleanor. YouTube, Eleanor Neale, 19 Apr. 2023, youtu.be/vDhD31pP_Ok?si=gcWSfP6itXiP2fnF.
YouTube, Associated Press, 26 July 2008, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aHVNM_CLiAU.\Price, Stepheny. “Casey Anthony’s Progressive Tiktok Advocacy Blasted by Parents’ Lawyer: ‘They Don’t Need Her.’” Fox News, FOX News Network, 5 Mar. 2025, http://www.foxnews.com/us/casey-anthony-progressive-tiktok-advocacy-blasted-by-parents-lawyer-they-dont-need-her.
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