Is the Jimmy Kimmel Halloween prank cruel or damaging to children?

In My Humble Opinion
1

Around our house, this has really been a Great Debate, but since it involves a TV personality, I will post in Cafe Society.

For those unfamiliar, here is a video. (YouTube link)

Late night TV host Jimmy Kimmel has a gag he does every Halloween where he asks viewers to record a prank on their kids and send him the video. On the morning after Halloween, parents tell their children that they stayed up after the kids went to bed and ate all of their Halloween candy. The children are mortified, angry, and generally overwrought and the reactions are played for entertainment.

So, is this prank mean or cruel to children? Does it damage the children or their relationship with parents? Is it important that the parent return the candy to the child afterward? Should the child be forgiven any disrespectful outburst at the tragic news of the loss of his/her candy at the hands of his/her parents?

For us, this is not merely an academic exercise. I have to grandchildren, both boys. One is two years old and the other is three months. Neither is old enough to understand the prank, but they will be. My daughter and son-in-law think that the prank is hilarious. My wife agrees.

I am not so sure. However, I don’t tend to get upset at what other people do to their own kids. I’ve been a teacher for twenty-three years and I have known parents do far worse than eat their kids’ candy. I have chuckled at the video, but I feel guilty afterward.

My son-in-law (who is not of the highest moral fiber, anyway), posted the video on Facebook. My mother (the kids’ great-grandmother) was rather harsh in her criticism of the video and, by extension, my son-in-law. This has caused a rift. “Unfriending” has happened. :eek: Naturally, my wife wants me to DO SOMETHING to reign my mother in. :rolleyes:

I will not bore you with more of my family dynamics, but what about the prank? Is it funny or evil?

2

I wouldn’t have the heart to do it to my kids when they were 7 or 8. But at around 12 or 13, they turned into the most obnoxious things. I’da done it to them then for sure.

3

Can it be both? I know it’s not nice, but they do make me laugh.

Oh god, I know this makes me evil.

4

Short answer… It’s pretty fucked up.

Kinda like that joke something something stop crying wipe your bloody **** on its doll/ shirt

Alas we went to war in the Middle East it’s time to regale them with our tales of heros and the cost of love

5

It seems pretty mean to me.

I guess if people don’t mind if their kids grow up to despise them …

Certainly if the candy is not eventually returned, and if the kids are not forgiven any resultant outbursts, any parents who do this are complete assholes.

6

I am NOT going to feel guilty about giving trick or treaters caramel covered onions on a stick. And chocolate covered brussels sprouts.

7

I think it’s funny, and I don’t buy the claim that it’s damaging to children beyond a fleeting moment. I doubt anyone is in therapy because their parents once pulled a silly Halloween prank on them.

8

Watching those videos, I was completely unsurprised that the kind of parents who would do this to their kid have kids who would throw those kinds of tantrums?

9

Wat?

10

If you (general you) don’t care about shattering your kids’ trust in you, have at it.

11

The joke… it goes something like… Why was the little kid crying? Because you wiped your bloody penis on its doll?

seemed a fitting comparison, with the reactions.

12

It isn’t hurtful. I pull verbal pranks like that on my kids all the time. My 12 year old still falls for them every time while my 8 year old just rolls her eyes and tells her sister that I am just messing with them. It is just good natured family fun.

13

I pull verbal pranks (“What should we have for dinner?” “I dunno…” “Okay, let’s eat squirrel toes and slug slime!” or “Oh, no, we’re having pizza again? Too bad WhyKid doesn’t like pizza. That’s okay, we’ll make her Brussel Sprout Surprise while we eat pizza.”) but those are clearly ridiculous and fleeting, and delivered with an almost immediate wink and hug.

What bothers me about these isn’t the idea of *telling *the kid you ate their candy. I might do that. It’s that it goes on so long. This isn’t about teasing the kid with the momentary thought that you ate their candy, it’s about actually *convincing *them you ate their candy. That’s where it crosses the line for me, from joking/teasing to being a dick.

I try not to be a dick to my kids, because, yeah, I think it’s cruel.

14

It’s mean, cruel and nasty.

In other words, the perfect prank to play on children, who are the same.

15

Vicious shit for the generation raised on cruel shock jock pranks. Not funny.

The kids who just go sad-faced and say, “It’s okay” just fuckin’ pwn me. I’ll testify for them when they think it’s funny to carve a happy face in mommy’s flappy tits.

16

Say what there now, young fella?

17

My general rule for pranks is this: it should be just as fun for the victim as it is for the perpetrator.

It is bad enough when people pull these kinds of pranks on people who are almost their equals (because let’s be frank, you are never somebody’s equal when they are holding your stuff hostage for a lark), but it’s fucking abhorrent to tell a child that the person who holds everything they hold dear at their mercy will steal from them for their own personal enjoyment.

18

Yeah, that.

Tell your kid “hey I ate your candy, yum yum” all you like … if you know they’re going to get it.

If they say ‘ha ha very funny now cough up’, or give you a good poking with a sharp stick - you’re fine.

If they cry, you fucked up.

If they cry and you put the video on the intertubes, you fail at parenting. I’m kind of horrified (though sadly not surprised) that there are enough people out there who don’t get that, that this is even ‘a thing’

19

Well said. I have young children, and would never, ever try to make them cry on purpose. You’d have to be a pretty fucked up parent to think it funny.

20

Damaging? Not really. Cruel? Possibly. I think it largely depends on how it’s done, and the family dynamic. If your relationship with the child is the type that is always joking around with fun little pranks, and you do it in a fun way, it can be a fun experience.

Where it starts to bother me is how far you have to take it to get on TV. It’s the reactions that they want, so of course you are going to have to drag that part out. It becomes less about a fun experience for the kid, and starts to seem more like trolling.

At least the Christmas prank (where you give your kids stupid gifts) has a bit a lesson thrown in. That is, that Christmas isn’t about gifts, and that you should be thankful for what you have. But Halloween is about candy, and the kid kinda earned that candy. Plus the Christmas one comes with an extra prize at the end–usually the kid gets something they really really wanted.

Maybe you could add that to the Halloween one, and I’d like it better? Maybe when you give them their candy, you could also give them a large amount of their favorite candy?