Editorial: Reality bites
The hoax about a boy carried off in a weather balloon shows what happens to some parents when the fame and cash of "reality" TV beckon.
The hoax about a boy carried off in a weather balloon shows what happens to some parents when the fame and cash of "reality" TV beckon.
Much of the nation's attention was riveted last week by news coverage of the flying-saucer-shaped balloon soaring high above the Colorado landscape. The family of Falcon Heene, 6, told authorities the boy might be aboard the wayward aircraft.
National Guard rescue helicopters were scrambled at a cost of thousands of dollars. Denver International Airport was closed briefly. When the balloon was retrieved without the boy, law enforcement officials searched for his body along the flight path, fearing he had fallen out.
As the nation now knows, little Falcon is safe. He was never on the balloon. A local sheriff now says that the episode was a publicity stunt, and that parents Richard and Mayumi Heene may face felony criminal charges.
The husband and wife had appeared previously on the Wife Swap reality show, and the sheriff said the balloon stunt was concocted to land another "reality"- TV deal. If so, perhaps the couple should sign a deal about real opportunists who go to a real jail.
If the Heenes were trying to exploit their children for financial gain, they will need to answer in court for it. But the sad truth is that their notoriety still could enhance their marketability someday in the increasingly deceptive world of "reality" TV.
These television shows are all the rage because they're relatively cheap to produce and they feed the public's illusion that everyone can be a "star." But audiences need to start asking themselves more often whether they are being hustled, and whether children are being put through an emotional wringer for the sake of ratings.
For example, what is "real" about a show featuring a young couple struggling to raise eight kids in Pennsylvania (Jon & Kate Plus Eight), while they're being paid $75,000 per episode? But the recent breakup of the self-absorbed parents is all too real.
These shows wouldn't exist without the audience demand for them. And so a fellow like Richard Heene - storm chaser, nutty professor, and wannabe TV star - will even risk putting his family through turmoil stressful enough to cause his son to vomit on live television.
Judgment-impaired parents sometimes make the reprehensible decision to exploit their own children for 15 minutes of fame. But the growing "reality"-TV market bears some responsibility for encouraging them.
