On Reality TV, Who's Minding the Kids?

More Shows Raise Issue of Exploitation

A frazzled teenager drags a toddler by the arm, shrilling in disgust upon seeing that the tyke has pooped. Meanwhile, out of reach, the child's parents watch horrified on closed-circuit TV, saying:

"You can't drag him by the arm! No, no, no, no, no! That's not good."

In real life, such a scene might quickly result in caregivers upbraided, lawyers called and accusations of abuse.

On television, it becomes a hit new show.

The program in question is NBC's "The Baby Borrowers," on which teenagers play parent and care consecutively for infants, toddlers, tweens, teens and senior citizens. But perhaps the biggest surprise surrounding this surprise hit is that it's got plenty of company along the dial this summer. Hollywood has long exploited, and sometimes endangered, child actors; now critics contend that the industry is courting controversy by doing the same to "real-life" kids -- that is, children who lack both Screen Actors Guild cards and, it seems, overprotective parents.

As millions of viewers watch these reality shows, a central question about the casting emerges: Is reality TV too real for real-life kids?

"It is a hard ethical line which nobody has quite drawn yet," says Anne Henry, co-founder of BizParentz, an advocacy group for parents of children in entertainment. "Society hasn't drawn it. Everybody pushes the envelope one more time."

Another new reality show pushing the ethical envelope is "The N's Student Body," which debuted this month on Nickelodeon's teen-programming network. Viewers follow Chaz, a 332-pound high-schooler, as he visits his mother in intensive care, not long before she dies of complications from morbid obesity, we are told. Later, looking at a computer screen, Chaz takes in an image of what he'll look like in 25 years -- if he doesn't change his diet and lifestyle. "I look just like my mom," a crying Chaz says. As he breaks down, the camera is right there.

The question again rears its head: Is a child's deepest grief ready for its close-up? This is a crucial point of debate among TV executives, child advocates, lawyers and the participating families themselves. They also address the related question: Is this programming exploitation, or edutainment?

"A lot of what happens in producing a reality show is in the hands of the producers," says Sarah Tomassi Lindman, senior vice president and general manager of the N, which produces "Student Body." "If you know that your intent is not to be exploitative, then it won't be."

Children on non-scripted television are nothing new, of course, from performing tots on "The Ed Sullivan Show" a half-century ago to the Loud family on PBS's seminal 1973 series "An American Family" to the potty-mouthed brood on MTV's "The Osbournes" several years ago. But as the current trend in reality TV has morphed, Hollywood is finding new ways to devise shows that capture children's rawest emotions -- potentially putting them at risk physically and psychologically, some advocates say.

A third reality show that aired this summer, A&E's "Psychic Kids: Children of the Paranormal," features young people who, according to the show, receive professional help to cope with "their gifts." Viewers see Faith, 8 -- who says, "Ghosts try to talk to me" -- and two other children taken to a "haunted house" where, aided by an adult medium, they learn how to handle seeing dead people. For the cameras.