Posted on 11/17/2008 12:17:58 PM PST by buccaneer81
‘Jon & Kate’ are doing their children no favors By Mark A. Perigard
TLC’s favorite fertile couple renews their vows tonight.
But this wedding may have some viewers raising objections.
As the episode opens, the Gosselin clan - parents Jon and Kate, twins Mady and Cara and the 4-year-old sextuplets - are vacationing in Maui.
The parents hammer out a renewal ceremony. The girls go for pedicures. Jon meets with relatives he hasn’t seen in several years.
Even by “Jon & Kate” standards, it makes for a slim show.
Why do the couple feel the urgent need to renew their vows after only nine years of marriage? Kate tells the camera that she wants her kids to know that while not all moms and dads stay together, she and Jon are forever.
As the ceremony later demonstrates, not even the oldest girls understand the ceremony’s significance, and the youngest surely will forget it.
This cynic is forced to conclude the “wedding event” is a way to capitalize on a free vacation in Maui.
“Jon & Kate” has become increasingly about the freebies the Pennsylvania family can gather. The visits to increasingly far-flung destinations are nothing more than travel infomercials, with the kids as adorable props. Jon’s morning on a golf course here is a chore to the eyes, but he dutifully plugs the management in his armchair confessional.
If we’re rewarding people on the basis of fertility, shouldn’t the prizes go to the least blessed?
Yes, it’s kind of horrible the way Kate talks to Jon as if he’s one of the 4-year-olds.
As he samples wedding cakes tonight, Kate tells the wedding planner, “I’ll try what he decides. And then I’ll argue, if he decides wrong.”
But as my favorite relationship coach - that would be Judge Judy - would say, he picked her. Save your concern for the children.
Mady, for example, almost has a meltdown when her mother expects her to be her maid of honor. Is she just another reality show witch? No, she’s just an 8-year-old, having a perfectly normal moment for a child - that is being broadcast to millions of homes.
The younger kids have been trailed by cameras for almost their entire lives. What does that do to a child’s perception of the world and his or her importance in it?
The kids might not mind the cameras following them now, but they’ll probably feel differently in about 10 years when their high school classmates can download footage of their potty training to their iPods.
Imagine having all your worst moments from childhood available to anyone who wanted to see them for the rest of your life.
That’s what the Gosselin children face.
Maybe it’s time for Jon and Kate to drive the cameras out of the home for some quality family time.
I see what you're saying, but I have two main issues with the show.
First, Kate needs a therapist; she acts atrociously on camera, and I shudder to think of her in private.
Second, so many kids who grew up on camera have become absolute trainwrecks as adolescents and adults. There are too many to list.
I agree that some comments about the Gosselin's family size are inappropriate. As long as the parents are providing for their kids (and not relying on the taxpayers to do so) then who cares how many kids they have or how they are conceived?
But if the wife regularly strikes her husband and belittles him in public, *shouldn't* we bash her for it? That's not acceptable behavior.
With respect, how do you arrive at that conclusion? Are you qualified to make that comment? And you are correct that many child stars really do end up badly. I don’t think this is quite the same—they are being themselves in their own home with their parents.
Also, I know you will agree that this family has every right to make their decisions for themselves. This is what this site is all about FREE REPUBLIC. So I think that Jon and Kate have the right to pursue this show if they wish.
Those of us who like them should watch—those of us who don’t should watch something else.
She doesn’t “strike” him-she pats him on the cheek (face)and the belittling part is just what you want to take from it. They addressed this in one episode—she is blunt and they both admit that some of their comments will appear strange to others, but that is how they communicate in certain sitations and they understand what is meant.
Honestly, are we all so touchy feely these days?
I'm not a shrink, but I play one on FR ;-) Kate is acts like an OCD sufferer with an anger issue.
But I do agree with you that they have every right to do what they are doing as far as making a living with the show.
Okay, then. We have found our common ground.
I think you should lighten up on Kate, though. She is tough, but I like her. If she wasn’t the organized type,no one could find anything. I think it works for the situation she is in.
Thanks for getting it.
“... pumping them out ...”
Your low estimation of newborn life is evident.
Maybe I'm a little overly sensitive because I've had to help friends and family deal with abusive relationships. I've found that what often appears like mutual understanding in a relationship is really just one partner submitting to mistreatment for the sake of the kids, or for fear of being alone, not wanting to cause a scene, etc.
But I don't know these people or what really goes on in their relationship. So like you suggested, I'll just choose to watch other things.
Thanks for your comments, but believe me, I know abusive relationships when I see them. I lived in a 20 year marriage that was abusive and Jon and Kate don’t come close to that description.
What is worrying me about this entire thread, not directing this at you, is how overly sensitive everyone is becoming these days. People have to be careful how much they are reading into situations. I think they have dry and slightly sarcastic humor towards each other and that it is being misread.
It's disrespectful for any wife, frankly. I know a couple where the wife is sarcastic, dismissive, critical. The guy is a shadow of what he used to be. Sad to see.
I watched a couple of the early shows and couldn't stand it anymore. I felt so sorry for that husband. The misery on his face was palpable.
I’m orry, but I consider the hairplugs (for any man) to ba an atrocious example of vanity.
A tummmy tuck after a sextuplet pregnancy...well, despite the fact that it’s technically cosmetic, that would seem more like a restorative thing to me.
See post 18, if you haven’t already.
Although I’m not on board with the whole “the Roloffs are saints” thing, it should be pointed out that an accident is an accident and that it may not have resulted from negligence. I cringe at the thought of what you might say about some of the accidents my kids have had if people were filming us all the time at the time it happened. Each of the older two has left the house in an ambulance...
She sounds like she has a sick sense of humor. She and I would probably get along great. LMAO
Gotcha.
So true, and sometimes a little peer disapproval can be a good thing. A desire to fit in might make her alter her behavior because all Kate does is explain it away. I'd bet TLC already edits out the really over the top stuff.
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