A TikToker's video of a birthday prank blew up. Now she's forced to defend her marriage as viewers label her husband's joke a 'red flag.'

• A TikToker posted a video of her husband smashing cake in her face at her son's 1st birthday.
• Some users accused the husband of insensitivity, while others said the TikToker was in the wrong.

A woman has defended a video of her husband smashing cake in her face after viewers said they were convinced it showed he was a bad partner.

"The time I wanted to choke my husband," a TikTok user from Tampa, Florida, named Candi Mulroy captioned a video posted May 2, which showed the couple singing happy birthday to their then 1-year-old son Robert. Towards the end of the clip, Mulroy's husband picked up the cake and appeared to try and feed some to his wife, before abruptly smashing it onto her face.

Mulroy has since said in a subsequent TikTok post that the incident took place around a year ago, and she posted the video of it thinking it was funny to look back on, adding that the family has since "moved on." In the caption on her original post, however, she mentioned that she was upset at the time because she was looking forward to taking family photos at her son's party, but they didn't end up taking any together because she had to shower to wash the cake off herself.

"I cried like a baby at the memories lost," her caption continued.

The video blew up, receiving 6.8 million views compared to her previous videos which were viewed a few thousand times.

As the clip spread, it also caused controversy. Some commenters turned against Mulroy's husband and accused him of insensitive behavior, with some expressing outrage and referring to his actions as a "red flag" — a term used to highlight a negative sign usually relating to a person's behavior in a relationship.

Some commenters even suggested that Mulroy should consider separating from her husband. "Him humiliating you and finding joy in it is enough to leave," one user wrote.

Other commenters jumped to Mulroy's husband's defense, saying they thought he was clearly joking and trying to have some fun. They also accused Mulroy of being "dramatic" in her caption, suggesting her upset reaction was disproportionate.

While most commenters appeared to take sides, showing support for either Mulroy or her husband over the video, a handful said they did not think it was their place to weigh in, and urged Mulroy not to pay attention to the online speculation.

"Don't throw your whole relationship away by taking advice from strangers on tiktok. Sometimes men just don't get it. He just didn't get it," one user wrote.

In her comments section, Mulroy pleaded with viewers to not leave hateful remarks, writing that they were "weighing on me and my family."

In a follow-up post from May 6 where she addressed the controversy, she said she had been struggling to "keep up" with the intense online reaction her post received.

"This thing has just become an animal of its own and just taken off," she said.

Mulroy defended her husband, saying that while the pair does sometimes face relationship issues "like any other couple," the criticism is unfounded. "He is not by any means a shitty father. He's a damn good daddy," she said.

She also defended herself against people who suggested she was exaggerating or acting "entitled" with her remarks, saying she believes she had good reason to be upset about the incident. She explained that she previously struggled to conceive, but when she did have a child, she was so excited for his first birthday and was upset that she didn't get any photos from the day. She also said she felt embarrassed about having the cake in her face in front of the crowd and relatives of her husband who she hadn't previously met before.

She urged commenters to "be kind" and not to read into her emotions or intentions behind posting the video, saying, "I didn't post it a year later because I still have angry issues with it."

Mulroy did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.

On TikTok, videos posted by couples often go viral, and can sometimes cause intense controversy when viewers spot what they believe to be "red flags" between them. Commenters have been known to intensely analyze a person's behavior or body language in a viral video to support their theories about whether they're a good partner.

In April, a British TikToker defended her partner from online hate after she posted a photo of him watching sports while she was in labor, leading viewers to suggest he was uncaring. Last year, a college couple also faced intense online scrutiny over a video of them reuniting after a few months apart. Commenters suggested the boyfriend's body language in the clip showed he was uncomfortable, and this spiraled into theories that he was cheating on her, which the couple said were entirely untrue.

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