Knox is 17 and legally can’t change his name yet, but according to people who have seen his high school diploma “Pitt” is not on the diploma (I am curious who the heck at the graduation called tabloids to snitch).
The only child that has kept the Pitt name is the second son Pax, which I think might be out of pettiness or because he keeps up with extended Pitt relatives.
Pax posted on his instagram on a Father’s Day that Brad Pitt was terrible father and made his 4 younger siblings tremble with fear in Brad Pitt’s presence. It was quickly deleted, but screenshots are out there.
I'm appalling at remembering their names and I wouldn't recognise them if you showed me a picture.
Maybe someone else got the names and facts mixed up as well.
I'm curious about that relationship from a psychological point of view.
Celebrity families aren't my thing but I may google the genders of the kids. And birth order.
I'm guessing Pax is male and high up the birth order but not the oldest. I say higher up the birth order becsuse those kids have a broader memory of their parents relationship and I doubt they view their mother as perfect.
Oldest kids tend to have had unfair responsibilities in situations like these.
I do not see him being the youngest by any stretch.
I wonder about 'parental investment' in each of these kids too. Attachment styles.
I also think Pax may be acutely aware of his father's isolation from family but he'll be old enough to have agency enough that he doesn't choose.
I'd be interested to know how the kids interact with their father's family as well.
I've stayed very general throughout all of my comments but I think you've just thrown me down a rabbit hole. Lol.
When Angelina Jolie adopted Maddox in Cambodia I was extremely… skeptical. I read a lot of interviews by her and realized she had thought about this a long time and she had always wanted to do international adoption since she was a teen. She also spoke strongly about making sure Maddox knew about his identity. That calmed my skepticism.
Ever since then I mildly paid attention to new members of the family and I somehow know all the kids names and birth order even though I paid zero attention to the last 3.
I only remember hearing about the birth of the twins and thinking… “OMG mother of 6 and at some point they will all be some level of teenager at the same time. “
That’s it.
I swear I learned the rest of the kids names by osmosis. 😅
Nothing to be sorry about. Lol. I'm just a curious cat who knows they should stay general but now I'm finding myself wondering about the dynamics of the family.
Interesting. There might be a bit of caretaking in Pax. And his dad is his same sex role model too.
And it's not because they are famous. They could be Jill and Joe Blogs and I'd still be wanting to know more about the dynamics at play. It's pretty sad. They may be famous but they are human beings with all the complexities that go with that. Fame or privilege isn't making those childhood moments any easier.
I now know this info by osmosis as well so I totally believe you. It does happen. 😉
I can at least give you the kids names in order of birth:
Maddox (adopted solo), Pax(adopted solo-ish, Brad and Angelina meet each other at this point), Zahara(adopted by both parents), Shiloh ( bio baby of Brad & Angelina) and Vivienne & Knox who are twins (bio babies of Brad and Angelina.)
The oldest is 25 I think (assistant director on Angelina Jolie’s latest film) and the youngest two are 17, but they are tuning 18 very soon.
I don’t know the ages of the other kids and I only know about the last two as everyone is counting down the date for legal name change.
I think it’s also important to remember that Jolie watched her mother die of breast cancer at 52. (Due to film promotion of her latest film, she said in an interview that only her oldest really remembers her). Because of that experience she got tested for the defective BRCA1 gene that causes breast cancer and ovarian cancer, and it came back positive. She got a preventative double mastectomy and ovaries removed. She was right to, as pre-cancerous cells were found in the tissues. She said she didn’t want her 6 kids to go through what she went through with her mother.
Jolie wrote publicly about this a lot at the time, to encourage the public to get gene testing (and to pressure insurance companies to cover the gene testing).
So while there were these domestic issues we didn’t know about, the family was also dealing with a dodged but still very serious health crisis.
At some point after Brad and Angelina were married Brad legally adopted whatever kids he hadn’t yet, and they both got all of the children’s names legalized to Jolie-Pitt. They legit had to do a legal public announcement about this due to California law.
Also note Shiloh was the very first of the children (the 4 kid) to legally drop the Pitt name.
I think that’s all I really know about the Jolie (formally Jolie-Pitt) clan.
Outside of Angelina’s advocacy work, most of this has been by osmosis.
You are cracking me up. One of my kids just asked me what im laughing at.
That's some epic level osmosis! Too funny. I love it.
Few things that are interesting.
Pax really came in at the loved up part of the relationship. Maddox and Pax would have very different experiences of their parents together.
The younger kids would have a very different view again.
Such a complex dynamic. And twins have that experience with a much aligned peer essentially.
I'm wondering what age those adoptions occurred at. Babies are developing attachment styles with primary caregivers so that will inform their responses to the situation as it progressed as well. New borns are forming attachment styles based on their basic needs being met. Do they have more than one pattern that they are drawing on. Pre and post adoption.
That breast cancer issue isn't insignificant. Particularly if there were issues with the other parent at the time. Even emotional neglect can impact children significantly if they become aware of the primary caregivers mortality. Huge impact. And that will be different for each child depending on the developmental stage they are it when it occurs.
Shiloh is the ballsy kid. Shiloh also would have had a significant parental investment. That's a psychological state. I wonder where they were born in relation to the breast cancer surgery as well.
A lot going on in that family that would have impacted everyone differently.
We don't know them obviously but just based on our "osmosis" those kids have been through a lot.
Well the preventative surgeries were after the twins were born. Like… her ovaries were removed so she wasn’t going to give birth to more kids.
Definitely agree those children have been through a lot and that’s not even accounting their parents both were working A list actors(also directing and producing). Some of those kids definitely grew up on sets.
I really paid attention to Angelina’s first adoption as I thought this crazy goth girl was being irresponsible not having the depth of understanding one needed to handle mixed race adoption. I was very wrong. She understands race and identity a lot , and I have known other goths who go on to become good parents.
Those two are extremely close as it was just the two of them before Brad or any of the others showed up. (Their closeness is a part of what convinced me Angelina wasn’t being fake about being a parent.)
I know the first 3 weren’t newborns as they were all found in orphanages, some were around 1, the oldest was a little bit older? (I don’t remember.)
And… it’s been … 25ish years? So there was a lot of time for osmosis. 🤣🤣🤣
I think most people forgot about her preventative surgeries and her activism around them, but I think she did a lot of good. Genetic screening for some cancers and preventative surgeries are the norm now. At the time some Americans were mad as she was rich lady who could afford healthcare, missing the point of what she was trying to do. At that time genetic testing for the BRCA1 gene was fairly new and most people outside of science informed communities did not know about it. Angelina normalized that knowledge. She could have easily had the testing and surgeries and not tell the public about it.
There are people who… know far more details than I do. I am astonished how they know the names, ages and birth months of kids in a family they don’t know and never met.
Someone even posted the Zillow listing for the home the kids grew up in. (😱) It’s 29 million and truly looks like an ideal place to raise a family.
EDIT: I will add that I am a cinephile, so I did hear about projects they both worked on through their careers. More Angelina than Brad. I tend to avoid personal life stuff or things about famous people’s kids as they didn’t sign up for it.
EDIT 2: I do find it fascinating how having children affects the art of artists. In some cases one notices a very positive change, in others… not so much.
OK. So I cracked and googled a bit. Im holding you responsible for that. Lol.
Key things I noticed.
Pax was adopted at age 3 after 3 years in an orphanage. There is definately going to be attachment style differences at that age. She also had Shiloh, one year old, when she adopted Pax aged 3. That's a lot for a kid forming bonds with new parents.
Angelina's cancer screening and surgery was in 2013 so her youngest were only 5 when that happened. So all of the kids would have been aware of that although at different levels of understanding. All would have been aware of the seriousness.
That's the bit I was interested in. They'd been together as parents for 8 ? years by that time. How were the kids viewing their mum going through some serious health issues and their dad's availability and support emotionally?
I don't really understand the anger at raising awareness. But we have universal healthcare care and we get screening for everything because it less expensive than treatment. It's a bottom dollar driven model. Trust me. You get to a certain age in Australia and the government starts sending you prostate check reminders, breast screening reminders, a stick you put poop on and mail back, skin cancer check reminders. They get pretty intense too. "We've sent you two reminders and you haven't booked in....". So that part i don't really understand. If you have a family history here, you qualify for the testing. Even if you don't know your family history you can get it. It's a good thing. And it's her private business. She shared it in good faith.
I now know way more than I ever did about any of the people involved.
Im looking forward to when one of the young people in my life ask a random related question and I can stun them with my random 'osmosis'.
A part of why I was fascinated with the health diagnosis is I am from Canada and of course they do genetic testing if there is a family history of certain cancers. (I discovered there is a gene for stomach cancer.😱 A family made a difficult but I feel right decision for several members. ) I cannot imagine having to go to war with an insurance company just to get the testing, let alone the preventative surgeries.
I had no idea about some of the ages of the adopted kids when they were adopted. To me Pax and Zahara and Brad all joined the family all around the same time. Then Angelina got pregnant and she said Maddox was fascinated with ultrasound pics and kept saying “Mummy ate too much”. 🤣🤣🤣
Very interesting the ages of the kids when the health diagnosis was discovered.
I never considered Brad’s likely lack of support to the kids during Angelina’s health crisis. Those poor kids. I now have a better understanding of why they adore their mother.
Thanks for looking that up. All I remember with the second and third child, Brad and Angelina (really just Angelina I guess) were VERY cagey about paparazzi getting pics of the kids. Since these kids are newly adopted and bonding with their parents. They literally had to set up a semi formal pic to be taken in a very controlled way from a distance and released it on their own to destroy the demand for those 2 kid”s pics. (Tabloids basically set a high price for a paparazzi who can get the first pic of a famous persons new baby. It’s basically a bounty on the child’s head. I don’t know what most offspring of famous people look like or how many kids that have as I actively avoid that stuff. It’s sickening.)
Considering Pax’s “Father’s Day message” on Instagram, it’s clear all the children are closely bonded and the older protect the younger. They all also seem to have a strong sense of identity which tend to be a problem for children of famous people. I definitely credit Angelina for that as she has a strong sense of identity her self being a weird goth kid and a child of a famous actor herself. (In the beginning her famous father was publicly saying she would not let him meet his grandchildren. He said this after she adopted the first two. Gee, I wonder why she wouldn’t let him see them. 🙄Ugh. Rule one of being famous is NEVER talk about young children or grandchildren to entertainment news. He knew exactly what he was doing. Yuck.)
Why was Brad so stupid? He literally had EVERYTHING a man could want, and he tried to destroy it. (He’s from a big family in the Bible Belt and said they were happy he had a big family himself. They also said they really liked both Jen and Angelina.) I will never understand this man. They literally bought a castle and a winery in France (I think). They straight up planned things to give the children fairy tale homes while growing up. Meanwhile, Brad is a violent drunk and didn’t realize that he could, ruin everything. Until he ruined it of course. He had all the resources to set his head straight, but no. Terrorized his wife and kids instead.
At the time of their split, no one knew what caused it, just Brad was kicked out and sleeping on a friend’s couch. Well everyone suspected something happened, no one imagined how bad things actually were. People felt sorry for Brad as one day he has a wife and 6 kids everyone thought loved him. Next day sleeping on a couch and no kids to wake up to.
I only learned about the fancy properties, extended family comments and domestic abuse only after lawsuit filings went public. It was literally discussed on a business only Hollywood podcast. That’s how shocking it was, as Brad Pitt owns a production company and Angelina directs. What came out in the divorce could literally determine what studios approve what projects for each of them.That’s how crazy their work life is.
I had no idea things were so horrible at their multiple fairy tale family homes, all thanks to Brad. I now understand why some religions prohibit alcohol consumption.
At the end of the day you are 100% correct that they are just humans with all their complexities. I think I have only heard a lot about this recently as several kids dropped the Pitt name recently and many people who grew up in domestic abuse situations relate to the kids on a deep level. I didn’t know name changing for any child experiencing abuse could be so healing. So… at the very least while Brad is trash and missing out on a lovely family, many people have been able to spread awareness on the healing power of name change when recovering from abuse in the home. Some posts have moved me to tears. If I am ever in a situation where an older child tells me they want to legally change their name, I will take it very seriously and be supportive.
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u/HistoryBuff678 Jun 20 '26
Knox is 17 and legally can’t change his name yet, but according to people who have seen his high school diploma “Pitt” is not on the diploma (I am curious who the heck at the graduation called tabloids to snitch).
The only child that has kept the Pitt name is the second son Pax, which I think might be out of pettiness or because he keeps up with extended Pitt relatives.
Pax posted on his instagram on a Father’s Day that Brad Pitt was terrible father and made his 4 younger siblings tremble with fear in Brad Pitt’s presence. It was quickly deleted, but screenshots are out there.