Children have been taking a leading role in many reality television series as of late. TLC is packed full of shows like “Jon and Kate Plus 8” and “18 kids and Counting,” a show about a strict Baptist family, and “Toddlers in Tiaras,” which follows tiny pageant members and their stressed parents.
Other examples of the craze are the ever popular Octo-mom, Nadya Suleman, who is planning to star in a reality series about her kids, and the newly famous Falcon Heene, the infamous balloon boy. Heene’s parents recently pled guilty to staging their son’s disappearance by balloon in order to gain publicity for a television show they were hoping to create.
Is it healthy to put children in front of the camera so early? Kate Gosselin mentions often in her television shows and interviews that “everything we are doing is for the kids.” But is it really? Was it really best for the kids to have their lives subjected to millions of viewers every night? It certainly wasn’t their decision, but was it their parents’ right to choose this life for them? This story brings to memory that of the famous Dionne Quintuplets, the first quintuplets to survive infancy. The five girls were made wards of the provincial government of Ontario, who proceeded to turn the girls into mini profit-makers. They were made to live in the Dafoe Nursery, where the public could observe their daily lives for a fee. The “quints” became a famous tourist attraction and earned both the government and their parents a lot of money. They are generally considered a prime example of child exploitation. How different is this from Jon and Kate’s television series?
What effects will this series have on the Gosselin children? After living their whole lives in front of the camera, how are they going to handle the show ending, possibly forever? Up until now, the kids have lived in a kind of warped reality full of lights and cameras. Now they have to go back to being normal. How will that go over, especially in the wake of their parents’ increasingly nasty and exceedingly publicized divorce? These children may find themselves permanently affected.
Lynn Meschan, a professor of child psychology at Moorpark College, feels that it is too early to determine the affects of this relatively new phenomenon, as long term research is currently unavailable. Dr. Meschan did, however, see a correlation between what is happening in these households under scrutiny and research outcomes on bacteria.
“Bacteria grows faster under observation,” said Meschan. “Children growing up in the glare of the camera are not going to grow the same way as those raised under regular conditions. I would not recommend it and I would not do it with my kids.”
In watching “Jon and Kate Plus 8,” you have to wonder what the draw is. The show consists of half an hour of a family’s daily life; shopping, cleaning, cooking. Why watch it when one can get enough of that in your own home? The show’s drudgery is made even more unpleasant by Kate and Jon’s snipes at each other. It goes back and forth continuously over the 30 minutes. It’s doubtful that any of their eight children, looking back at these videos, will remember themselves as being a “happy family.”
