To be ashamed that I used to look up to 'Supernanny'

I love a reality tv "surprise" Greg Wallace following people round a supermarket and getting people to guess their bill and act surprised?

Surely, no one believes it?

I always felt that Jo Frost came across as a bully.

Yes.

Like a lot of these shows I think things got more extreme as they went on.

I always felt that Jo Frost came across as a bully. The way she spoke to some of those parents was vile. She threw food at one of them because she wasn’t serving what Jo deemed appropriate. I suspect many of the children filmed were also ND, and the whole process would have been traumatic for them.

I always feel it's unethical to put children on telly (or the internet) who are too young to consent, especially when it's for being badly behaved. I think there's a real issue with this.

Yeah it’s awful tbh.

Yeah it’s pretty awful.

You know we can see you edit history?

Both responses were rude

None of it was real. And a lot of what she taught had been disputed now.

Reality TV is scripted and heavily edited of course, but I can't watch that tiktok video because the kid playing with the blind on the window ledge is stressing me out.

Haha yes! But at least there were no kids involved who couldn’t consent.

I was a parent at the time and really disliked that programme because it felt exploitative but I do think there needs to be more teaching about parenting and support for families.

I look back and I think how awful that so many kids were subjected to all of these shows and how they were treated. Do you remember ‘brat camp’? Just makes me shudder to think about.

The entire show always based on a lie, especially the reveal, but that's ok because it's tricky for formats where the plot points require a specific narrative conceit?

That kind of "reality" ?!

Do you work in "reality" TV?

Our old nanny was asked if she’d like to consider it. She didn’t but if she had she wouldn’t have been turned down for being soft, she ruled the house 🤣

I genuinely believe it’s because tv isn’t made for people over 25 now. It’s a real shame. Leave social media to be dopamine-hit heavy fluff and broadcast proper documentaries etc on tv. Constantly chasing the young for some outdated notion about advertising wanting to attract young eyes is bullshit.

I barely watch TV nowadays because it's all scripted and manipulated and also designed to elicit emotions that I simply no longer have.

Most news programs and news outlets generally are the same.

I feel burnt out by media.

An asteroid could be heading for my back yard and I would not take notice of the news report about it. The world just feels like it's full of sclerotic shite apart from animals. Animals are great!

It was just of its time. I liked watching it 20 odd years ago and genuinely do think it helped some people in places where violence was the norm. It helped me when ds1 still wouldn't sleep except for on top of me age 2. I did the bedtime putting him back down in the cot 100 times on night 1, 50 on night 2 and night 3 he just accepted this is what bed is now.

I agree it hasn't aged well. The time out and rewards charts style parenting isn't going to work on a lot of children. The refusal to recognise neurodiversity and making money out of struggling children who can't consent feels all sorts of ick now. But I genuinely believe she cared about the children and did it for the right reasons. You can't judge the past by current morality.

I disagree entirely. There is a lot of duty of care that goes into making tv involving the public. Of course there are some notable exceptions and horrible outcomes, but I don’t think everyone - or even most people - making tv hates their contributors or audience.

It’s a shame the jig was up so early on your show, and arguably the producers made the wrong choice to hide it in the show, but it’s tricky with formats where the plot points require a specific narrative conceit.

She didn't have a speech impediment.

And some of it is filmed in studios / sets rather than in the wild.

Years ago I used to buy into these type of shows, naive looking back.

I was once involved with a charity, I won't name the show but it involved someone who was rich " secretly" joining the team, then after getting involved " revealing" themselves to be a rich benefactor.

On the first day one of the volunteers said " I think you are from that show", it was so obvious.

When the grand " reveal" came, we had to film it numerous times until we looked surprised enough.

Most TV is fake bar sports but "reality" TV is probably the fakest of them all.

I think the people who make these shows largely despise their subjects and their audience.

I haven't watched the link but if it's the US version all these things are more scripted and usually contain some sort of disclaimer about this.

I found the consistency she promotes very useful when I had my own children. I returned them to bed kindly and calmly but was very much in the 'its bed time ' camp (once past babies). It does work.

I can't imagine too many families with impeccably behaved children applied but equally, filming takes place in a limited time frame so I can see that they'd use ways of 'recreating' situations or dramatising them further than reality. This applies to virtually everything. You know even David Attenborough programmes cut footage together to create a story that isn't exactly as it happens.

There was an episode of House of Tiny Tearaways (much more problematic show, I thought) where they sent the family home early because the kids wouldn’t misbehave on set.

As critical I’ve been about supernanny in my post I do actually agree with this.

it must be really hard to get some children to act up at all on camera. When uncomfortable some children act out, others shut up.

even if they children were acting up it would still highlight parents difficulties in managing them.