Anything for Money and Fame

The world was horrified when they heard about Kerry Campbell, the California mother who claimed to inject her 8-year-old daughter with Botox in order to get rid of wrinkles. Botox is not approved for use in children for cosmetic purposes. She also claimed to take her daughter to get "virgin bikini waxes". All this in preparation for child beauty pageants. Campbell claimed that Botox is used by many pageant moms, a fact disputed by veteran pageant coach, Valerie Hayes.

Campbell appeared on ABC's Good Morning America defending her actions to horrified Americans, including the reporter who interviewed her, but to the relief of many, it turns out that it was all a hoax. Kerry Campbell is actually Sheena Upton and she was paid by the UK tabloid, The Sun to play the role of Kerry Campbell. ABC New Network has now refused to pay $10,000 to a UK freelancer for the fake photos of Sheena Upton injecting her daughter with Botox. Sheena Upton temporarily lost custody of her daughter pending an investigation.

Although Upton admitted that she did not actually inject Botox into her daughter's face or give her waxing treatments, it does not mean that she is not a bad mother. She exposed her daughter to the public while having her lie on national TV. Most parents would not do this for any amount of money.This brings to mind another hoax involving a child, "Balloon Boy", in which Richard and Mayumi Heene claimed that their son, Falcon had floated away in a giant hot air balloon in order to gain publicity for future media interests.

Everybody wants money and fame and it seems that they will seek it at any price, even if it means pimping their kids for a few bucks. It's not fair for kids to suffer because their parents have delusions of grandeur. Reality TV has made celebrities out of nobodies, and besides endangering the well-being of our kids we will get pissy drunk, have sex on camera, and get into fights, all for 15 minutes of fame. It seems that bad publicity is better than no publicity at all.

The child of the Botox mom has been returned to her home on the condition that relatives stay with them for a period of time, but I wonder what damage has been done to her. At eight years old, she is unable to process what is right and wrong and she may end up feeling that it's ok to lie for fame or money if someone doesn't teach her otherwise. I hope this little girl grows up learns to have self-respect and I hope her mother never endangers her well-being again with another attention-getting scam.

Sources:

Evann Gastaldo, Botox Mom: I Made It Up For Cash, newser

Mark Russell, ABC Refuses To Pay 10K For Botox Mom Hoax, newser

California Girl Injected With Botox Removed From Mom's Custody, ABC News/US