Attention whoredom as the natural progression of Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy

Remember in the 80s and 90s, when the topic of Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy made the rounds of all the talk shows once or twice a year? You’d have the mothers (it was always mothers) who were just sick over what they’d done to their children, and poor Timmy and Samantha, who were hurt and bewildered that mommy could have hurt them like that. Sally Jesse/Ricki/Oprah/Phil etc. listened and tsked, the audience booed, the moms begged for forgiveness and vowed that they’d changed, and at the end of the hour, all again was right with the world.

But now I feel that the 24-hour cable news cycle and the interwebs have exponentially increased the audience for attention whore parents and simultaneously upped the ante at what has to be done to get sympathy and attention. Now, thankfully, the parents aren’t actually injuring or sickening their children. The sympathy comes from having something awful happen to your children, with no messy poison or beatings required. So there’s that. When I think of Richard Heene (father of Falcon Heene, AKA Balloon Boy) and Nic (no relation, seriously!) from My Bottle’s Up, I wonder if we’re seeing the confluence of Generation Me, people’s desire for fame at any cost, a 24-hour news cycle where not enough things that are deemed interesting happen to justify the depth of coverage, and an Internet audience that is always willing to respond to every real or purported outrage with blog and Twitter posts (I resemble that remark).

I was at work when the Balloon Boy saga began, and read about it quite by accident during routine visits to several news sites. My coworker and I kept refreshing the story on the NY Times’s site; it was the site’s central story, and every twenty minutes or so, a bolded Update: designation would provide more detail. At that point, little was happening, and the updates mostly involved where the balloon was spotted, until the news came that the balloon had landed and was empty. The whole thing was so horrifying, and we were genuinely worried about Falcon Heene. I kept following the story when I got home, although I drew the line at actually watching any of the annoying tv talking heads discuss something they knew nothing about. I just kept refreshing my browser until I read the resolution. I laughed like a loon when I found out that the kid was safe at home the whole time. My reaction was composed of equal parts relief, amusement, and disbelief. Why wouldn’t they have checked the house thoroughly?? My amusement became even greater when it started to look for all the world like the whole thing was engineered by people who knew that the little boy had never even been on the balloon. The world had been duped, and willingly so. The breathless attention paid to the Heenes is rather sick, when you think about it. If the child really had been in the balloon, and something awful had happened to him, what good would have resulted from the insane amount of attention the family was receiving?

TSA Mom was only brought to my attention this morning. I read her account of what happened, and thought, “Wow, that sucks. What is wrong with the TSA?” I’d been at that very airport earlier that morning, and had worn a metal headband that set off the machine. I took it off, walked through again, collected my belongings, and went on to my gate with no problem. I did find it convenient that somebody with such a huge web audience and reputation would have something like that happen, but didn’t necessarily want to speculate on whether what she said was true. Bad things can happen to anybody, even those with a steady blog readership.

The Metafilter thread about this was filled with comments that harshly criticized the TSA, and others that expressed mild or not-so-mild doubt as to the veracity of Nic’s account. I could definitely see where they would find room to doubt her story, but I felt bad just dismissing it out of hand, and erred in my (obviously erroneous) belief that nobody would make up such an awful story. The TSA, sick of the internet trouncing it was receiving over its reported behavior, actually posted the CCTV feed of somebody who they identify as Nic and her son going through security. They are detained in the box for about 2 minutes, but at no point is she separated from her son.

The Heenes were on ABC’s wife swap, so that kind of shows that they’ll do anything to get on tv, but I feel so sorry for Falcon, who doesn’t seem to possess his parents’ desire for limelight. If they do end up getting that reality show, the first item of business will obviously be to recast the youngest child.

As for Nic, I still find it insane that anybody would make up anything like this. I guess she didn’t expect the TSA to take the step of posting the video of her going through security. Maybe she didn’t mean to garner all of this attention, and thought they’d never hear of her claims. Maybe she just thought she’d brazen it out. After all, right now she’s about to go on a vacation and therefore won’t be around the internet much for the next 10 days or so. How convenient!

These people sicken me, because every time something like this happens, I grow a little more cynical and distrustful of people.