I was raised by a mother who did these kind of things, though not as pranks but parenting style. Once, around the age of 7 or 8, my sister and I got up early on a Saturday to watch cartoons. On the kitchen counter there was a small package of maybe 8 or so colorful, fruit shaped candy slices. It was a kind of candy we'd never really seen before. Something a previous night's dinner guest had brought as a gift, I suppose. We proceeded to eat them. When mom got up she went to make coffee and saw the empty package on the counter. She calmly turned to us and said "who ate the rat poison?" She scurried around the kitchen looking for "antidotes" all the while worrying out loud about whether she should call poison control or an ambulance, wondering how she would tell our friends we'd died, who would take care of our little kitten, etc., etc. My five year old sister and I were in terrified tears by the time she stopped and told us that it was just candy and she wanted us to understand we weren't to eat stuff that didn't belong to us. To this day, 45 years later, I still think of that morning and feel feelings of sadness and shame every time I see a package of that particular candy even though as an adult I know her actions were crazy and not my fault. Sadly, I could fill this entire forum with little stories like that. I wish they'd taken all the kids and put them with someone else. I noticed in one of the videos the dad "justifying" his and mom's behavior with the pranks. He asks the kids why they think the public is so outraged and one of the boys says "they're just jealous, they're haters". It's obvious those kids are on the fast track to becoming the same sort of parents if there is not some real intervention. I haven't repeated the pattern in my life because I got some help so they too could be rescued and the next generation of kids spared.