And Again

[Content Note: Pranks; bullying; hostility to consent; child abuse.]

Every year, late night talk show host Jimmy Kimmel invites parents to "prank their kids" by telling them they ate all of their Halloween candy, then film the kids' reactions and send them to his show so they can be compiled into a supercut of upset kids at which everyone can laugh.

This year's video is going viral, just as the video does every year. And every year, I get emails about it.

The thing about parents pranking their kids—and I cannot believe I need to write this—is that it fundamentally shatters children's security and trust in the idea that their parents will not harm them. (Which, in some of these families, may never have existed in the first place.) The takeaway for a child whose parents like to prank them is that their parent(s) might harm them, and no amount of "JUST KIDDING!" can fully repair the crack in the edifice of what should be an inviolable trust.

Parents who prank, tease, and ridicule their own kids, even if they're "just kidding," do so at the risk of their kids' ability to feel safe even in their own homes. That is not a risk any parent should be willing to take with a child.

And somehow, I don't imagine that "but I only did it so people could laugh at your despair on NATIONAL TELEVISION!" would bring a whole lot of comfort.

Stop it, parents. Just stop.

And you, too, Jimmy Kimmel. You're urging parents to harm their kids and then broadcasting the "hilarious" results on national television. None of these children can consent to what's happening to them. None of them can consent to their pain being broadcast for strangers' amusement.

Stop it.