Jon & Kate Plus A Few Lessons In Being A Difficult Woman

Friday May 29, 2009

Categories: Being Bad, Current Events, Fearlessness, Pop Culture Rules

So, yeah: Jon and Kate Gosselin. They've, like, got this TV show, right? About their life raising eleventeen kids? Wait - eight, is it? Whatever. I've never watched the show.

Which, I suppose, means that I shouldn't really comment on the whole sideshow that is the show and their lives. Or is it their lives and the show? Does anybody really know where the show stops and their lives begin, or vice-versa? Does it matter?

From what I can gather, Kate's what used to be called a difficult woman. That's what all the gossip sites and blogs and tweets say, anyway. She is, by all accounts, a spiky-haired harridan who has brow-beat her husband into a sub-manly pulp that can barely get up off the couch. She yells and scolds and harps and needles. She's controlling. She's bossy. She's an alpha-female of the very worst kind. She's an alpha-female who lords her alpha-ness over her family - and on the TV stage, no less - and that is - regardless of what anyone thinks of alpha-females in general - bad. After all, there are kids involved. A marriage. It's one thing for a woman to be that way - bossy, bull-headed, prone to yelling - in the boardroom or in the corridors of government or even - maybe - in the privacy of one's own home, but not - NOT - in the privacy of one's own home on television. Kate Gosselin is, in all of her screechy, harridan-like glory, a piece of work.

Or so I've heard. Like I said, I don't watch the show, so I'm limited in my ability to speculate on the specifics of her character. Maybe she is a total bitch-harridan. Maybe she's not. I'm not qualified to say. But I'm not - despite what the title of this post implies - really interested in what Kate Gosselin is or is not. What I am interested in is whether there's something of Jon & Kate - well, Kate specifically - in my own household. And if there's not, whether, perhaps, there should be. By which I don't mean, is there or should there be a bitchy, harridan-like edge to my own maternal and spousal behavior, or do I or should harangue my husband (obviously not), but rather this: do I comport myself as a mother and as a spouse from a position of power - am I, to use the psychotherapeutic vernacular, empowered, powerful - or from a position of weakness? And if it's the latter, shouldn't I - maybe - change that? Could I - could any mother, any woman - learn something from Kate - or women like Kate - about being unafraid to be powerful? To take charge when someone is needed to take charge? To be the tough guy, the bad guy, when it's called for (is it ever called for)? To just be the bitch, when the good of one's family requires it? Or is that just a slippery, dangerous slope? (One that, if the gossipnets are to be believed, leads straight to divorce?)

Is Kate really so bad? Could we - could I - maybe take a few leads from Kate? Maybe dialed back a bit, but still? Might Kate have a few things to teach us about being unafraid to be strong?

I don't know. I have some ideas, but still: I don't really know. It's something that I'm going to have to think about. Over the weekend, at least - during which time I plan to watch as much Jon & Kate as I can stomach. So, can I get back to you by, say, Monday?

In the meantime, if you have strong opinions one way or another - or even just mild, entirely undifficult opinions - I'd love to hear them.

Comments (41)

Filed Under: alpha female, jon & kate, kate gosselin, marriage, parenting, television

posted by Catherine Connors @ 6:55am Permalink email icon

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anonymous

June 2, 2009 11:00 PM

I feel very sad that Kate changed so much during the four seasons of jon and kate plus 8. She started really showing love to her husband, but then she was always belittely him. She has OCD and a sense that she is the only one that knows how to do things. Jon did help her but it never satisfied her. The beginning of the first few episodes she didn't care so much about clothes, just wanted to be a mother. Look at her now bikinis all the time and expensive clothes etc. She just wants the money and fame has gone to her heaed. I feel for the children always scared to get dirty, always performing for the cameras. I don't think they are christians. Kate and Jon have lost their way, their priorities are not the children anymore. She only thinks about herself, spas, clothes, trips showing her body. I pray that they realize that kids need their parents to put them first. So sad for the children, they need their mother and father more than all the toys, parties etc. I hope that they wake up that TLC cancels the show for the good of these angels.

Scotch Straight Up

June 3, 2009 6:04 PM

http://www.scotchstraightup.com

Dang! You're smart. Unconsciously, I've been struggling with how hard and unpleasant it is to be the b*tch, but until you wrote it and I read it, it remained under the surface. So, yea. It's uncomfortable always manning the rudder and keeping people on track and honest about their intentions. It's so appealing (to me, at least) to be liked and avoid unpleasantness. As a result, I turn my back on correcting mistakes and holding people accountable. Of course, then it gets out of hand and I look like a real b*tch screaming it all back together. Maybe a little b*tchiness each day is the answer.

strangemamma

June 4, 2009 6:24 AM

http://www.strangersinnormal.blogspot.com

I do watch the show (and I don't generally read comments when there are so many so forgive me if someone has pointed this out already) and I would say that for all of Kate's b*tching and barking and carrying on (let me say, too, that I actually like the show and feel for Kate, I probably feel for John more but hey) she is not actually a strong woman. Controlling, yes, strong, no. She is afraid of a lot. Some appear to be actual phobias, some seem to be a bit of an OCD personality, some is just general unease. She barks and orders and controls everything that she can out of that fear, not out of power. I want to be an 'empowered' woman (if we must go with that vernacular), I want to be a tower of strength in my home, for my family, but I want to do it with respect and love not out of fear and the need to control things. I think if Kate stopped for a minute and let John be the man that he is, she'd be pleasantly surprised to find him stepping up to the plate, then she could be free to be the awesomely organized and loving mom that she wants to be instead of running around spazzing out at things. (This is why I almost never comment. Too many run-on sentences)

Your Name

June 11, 2009 6:06 PM

I've watched the show over the years because you come to care for the family members and the logistics of this family are so amazing.

Poor Kate. She has an overwhelmingly challenging job running this large family and I respect her organizational skills. Unfortunately, as someone who's seen the family dynamics, she really doesn't have anything to teach us about being a powerful woman. She's got a lot of power with all of her responsibility, and regrettably she abuses it.

She's constantly snapping and snarling at husband and kids; she makes derogatory comments about them in front of others, she denies her children the chance to do normal kid things like eating melting ice cream or getting dirty playing because she sees the work it makes for her as more important than letting her kids have a normal life.

Don't get me wrong- I understand why she's stretched to the breaking point.There's too much work for one mother here, + her need for perfection doesn't help her.I'm sorry for poor Kate.

But folks don't describe her as a harridan because she's a strong woman that doesn't know her place. She gets that rep because she's let her overwhelming situation make her over into a nasty woman.

And I don't think she realizes that she's not only teaching her children organisation and nutrition, but also that men are inadequate fools and that it's appropriate for women to publically deride and attack them to control them.

Poor Kate. Poor John.Poor Gosselin children. This family really needs some help

fmd

June 14, 2009 11:50 PM

I finally did watch a few odds and ends of this show and I think it is important to see how she does behave. For instance she hits Jon and grabs his face to force him to "say" the things that she demands he say. She is never satisfied with what he does say or do. She mocks him when he mispronounces a word. (I have a vocab in the 99th percentile and I would NEVER do that to anyone!) She repeatedly scapegoats her eight year old daughter Mady as "whiney" and having a bad attitude. Why should Mady have a good attitude about being forced to perform for cameras on an almost daily basis?

If a MAN behaved the way Kate did we would without question say it was wrong! Let's not get hung up on the word "B*TCH." It is simply wrong for ANY HUMAN to behave the way Kate is behaving.

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