16 is when these spoiled brats get sold to rich oil sheiks to become their fifteenth wife and start pumping out sheiklets.
What?
Some of the first birthday cakes I’ve seen at friend’s babies’ birthday parties have been more elaborate than my WEDDING CAKE. And our wedding cake was pretty funkily-decorated (is funkily a word?).
I’m not sure I get the whole ‘going all out for a one year old who won’t remember shit’ for a first birthday, but I’m starting to realize that it’s all about outdoing your next-door neighbors. It’s not about the kids, it’s about getting a leg up.
E.
The kids, when they’re older, do sometimes get into that as well. It’s embarassing.
I hope my kids are the kind who enjoy the fake Kate Spades from Chinatown/funky home decorating items from Target/hand-me-down-or-garage-sale furniture that their mom and dad love (okay, Dad’s not into the purses…I hope…).
Of course, they probably will inherit my love for continuous Broadway, electronic gadgets and souped up computers, but they can use mine until they can afford their own 
.
Eh. Having not been to birthday parties for children for a very long time (we’re finally at the point where close friends and family are at that stage in life), it just kind of shocked me. One kid had a giant, fondant birthday cake with four tiers, decorated with all kinds of zoo animals made out of sugar paste. It probably could have fed 300 people, as opposed to the 50-75 of us that were there.
E.
What, you think they’re going to trumpet it if they are doing it?
That’s not a “cite”. That’s a marketeer’s blurb. It’s not evidence.
Look, I think the show is a total farce and is intended purely as entertainment. Viewers are meant to envy, dream, or hate what they see, and the producers are only filming these families because they’ve agreed to air their “spoiled brat.” They know what the producers want because the producers told them how to act.
And think about it: there’re only two motives that make sense here:
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“I’m so rich I deserve publicity.” O.K., this is plausible. Still, I don’t see all of these families being that easy to find. What are the odds that even MTV could find that many rich, tastless idiots fine with airing their lack of class on national TV, and showing the world how big a jerk their children are?
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“I get to throw a wild party and my face on TV, and I can act like a jerk the whole time!”
Sorry, but option (2) seems a lot more plausible.
One of my friends had a big party for her one year old. She admits it was because everything that first year was a big deal, especially since it’s their first child. It was still the good kind of big party-- catering by costco, two pinatas from the corner market, bunches of kids playing in the bounce castle (rented for thirty bucks), the whole neighborhood was invited and all were told gifts weren’t necessary. The closest thing to a pony was the donkey they were pinning tails to.
Growing up, a few kids had parents who did the birthday extravaganzas. The parents’ interest in providing them year after year tended to wane well before the kid left grade school. Sort of like how my photo album is chock-full, but my little sister’s is two pages of polaroids and a shoe box containing her school pictures.
Several brokers I know have told me how often they are astonished by how quickly someone can blow through an inheritance.
If these girls aren’t careful, their money may soon disappear.
You think MTV spends money on its shows? How quaint.
50-75 people at a child’s birthday party?
Sometimes you want to turn the channel, you want to read the paper, pick up a book, go for a walk… but it’s so awful, so outrageous you (well, er, I) keep watching just because the mind is boggled so.
I watched a half-hour infomercial about spray-on hair once, just because I couldn’t believe it was a real commercial for a real product. Boggled, I was.
Yep.
If you’re doing a :dubious: , imagine what the rest of us were doing. I didn’t even get near the ‘Baby of Honor’ at this party.
E.
Admittedly, I may just be overestimating the human race here.
Finding rich tasteless idiots to parade around on TV…slim odds, eh?
I’ll pass your observation along to Paris Hilton & Nicole Ritchie…and Nick & Jessica Simpson…and Hulk Hogan’s family…and Ozzy Osbourne’s family…and, well you get the picture. Yeah, real hard finding that.
I still note that you’ve yet to offer ANY evidence that MTV pays all of the costs.
What the hell, I’ll throw out more cites.
More you say?
More you say?
More you say?
This would be the point in the thread where you retract your claim.
Try being the sixth kid. Add to the fact that it was my dad who was the photographer and that he TDY to Alaska most of my first year and when he got back the camera was broken. Our next door neighbors have more baby photos of me than my family does.
(TDY means temporary Duty (yonder), military thing)
I just threw up a little.
I know people that worked on a MTV show (Austin Stories). The universal opinion is that MTV is cheap as hell. The actors received very low pay, and signed away any right to residuals. There’s no way MTV would lay out 6 figures for some spoiled rotten princess’s birthday present.
What I want to know is what is the mailing addresses for these families that are obviously burdened with way too much money? Maybe I’ll just send them some letters asking for some of it to help them out.
]
They do make us watch it!
The TV sits right in the middle of my living room and my two couches are pointed towards it.
It is not my fault!
I blame Ikea.
The rule in my family was always “N” guests, where “N” was how old the child was becoming. A five-year-old can’t deal with more than five guests. A thirteen-year-old will have just enough friends that 13 guests forces them to make tough choices on the last two or three guests. Oh, and once they’re old enough to have a job, mom provides hot dogs, soda, and cake – any additional entertainment is on the guests individually or on the birthday kid.
My 13th birthday party was a cake brought down into the dugout at a Little League game I was playing.
I’m 27, and my birthday party this year was four of my good friends going out for dinner after my Systems Engineering exam and having a nice night out.
I actually watched an episode of this show because of this thread. This proves how dumb I am. :smack:
That being said, at least I’m not one of those girls. Once the glamor of “I’m on TEEVEE!!!111!!” wears off, they’re just “That really, really, really bitchy girl whose parents should be shot” to most people around them. I would hate to have something like that jump up and bite me on the ass five years down the line when I’m at a job interview or meeting the parents or something.