Balloon family Heene "admit" hoaxing the world!

The Heene family of Colorado are just a product of our age. An intelligent father is seemingly seduced by the charms and apparant riches of reality television. He thought that, by staging this stunt and getting half the Colorado law enforcement officials up from behind their desks to go chasing a saucer-shaped balloon, he would get a better chance of being picked. Instead, he entered the largest reality show by default.

Most of the world knows of this family now. The children think it is all great fun. The sheriff is hopping mad and threatening jail time. And the world carries on.

I hope the lessons learned from all this is that irresponsible parents have an influence on their children. The sins of the fathers, etc. No good will come of jailing the parents. Possibly a hefty fine. But as in all things American, the fine is a crazily high amount for the particular crime. In this case a maximum of $500,000!! If it ever came to court and that was whacked onto the couple, the children would be the sufferers.

It's a salutary lesson in greed and ambition getting ahead of proper reality. So-called reality television is nothing of the sort. It is just another form of humiliation dressed up as entertainment.