Parents' Guide to Bloopers!

It's ironic that in a hypersensitive society such as ours, where anti-bullying messages are omnipresent in kids' home and school environments, we consider it high entertainment to point and laugh at embarrassing and painful moments of strangers' lives. You might argue that someone in each of these videos willingly submitted it knowing what people's reactions would be, and that is true. Unfortunately, though, kids might not get that, and it's the nature of our connected culture that video clips, pictures, sound bytes, texts, and emails can be posted to the world with a single key strike and without the knowledge of everyone involved, and so doing can cause real emotional harm to an unwilling subject.

Here's what it boils down to: Of course these video clips are funny. Two guys sitting on a roof causing a cave-in? A man misjudging the jumping distance to a pool? It's hard not to laugh in the moment, and for families searching for something to watch that's not sexed up or overly violent, this is a tempting choice. But the messages your kids get from this type of show might not be short-lived, and with their access to media through cell phones, iPod Touches, and even gaming systems, it could have unexpected detrimental results.