Kate Gosselin: A popular brand self-destructs
Filed under: Home, Career, Relationships, Celebs & Money
As Jon and Kate Gosselin's marriage has slowly self-destructed, Kate is finding that the brand she has so carefully built is under attack. A children's clothing line that she produced with Healthtex is on hold, and her latest book, Love in the Mix: Making Meals into Memories, has been sidelined while she and her husband work out their divorce.Reading through articles about these speedbumps, it's hard to miss the barely-concealed glee that underlies the reporting. Over the past few months, bashing Kate Gosselin has become a popular sport in America. By now, even people who haven't seen the show know that Kate can be disturbingly stern with her kids, that she is mean to her husband, and that she is greedy when it comes to snatching up the freebies of quick cable fame. Pundits have endlessly attacked her weight, her behavior, her child-rearing, and her hairstyle, until it seems that Kate isn't so much a person as the heart of a cottage industry in verbal brutality.
In a broader context, however, criticizing Kate is a joyless experience, largely because her downfall seems so completely, iconically American. A brief look at Kate's transformation from dowdy, dark-haired housewife to toned, hard-charging übermom functions as a visual primer on American ideals. Kate's current look, from her distinctive hairdo to her bronzed skin, reflects the emergence of a brand. In the past few years, Mrs. Gosselin has lived the American dream, morphing from devoted parent to media icon, from the woman who lived in a shoe to Kate Gosselin Omnipedia.
By comparison, her husband just seems to have gotten dowdy. Jon Gosselin suffers from that most un-American of failings: he's unambitious. Seemingly content to chug along at a dead-end job, playing backseat to a far more vivacious wife, he is a natural second-banana, a neighbor who can be counted on to provide for his family and show up at barbecues, but not the kind of guy who will end up running his own corporation.
In many ways, Jon has become a stone around Kate's neck. Even after he quit his job and became a full-time employee of Kate Gosselin, Inc., Jon seemed to sleepwalk through his life, happy to let his wife call the shots while he softened the edges of her occasionally too-tough love. In context, it's not hard to understand why Kate feels like she has to provide for the needs of her children.
The tough part about villainizing Kate is the fact that she doesn't seem to think she has a choice. Listening to her explain the activities that she gives her kids, one can hear a heavy helping of self-justification in her tone. On the show, even the most carefree of pastimes has a definite purpose, be it improving eye-hand coordination, increasing personal time, or working on fine motor skills. Over time, it begins to seem that Kate isn't running a family, so much as some sort of B.F. Skinner-inspired child-rearing experiment.
Beneath the "Mom as CEO" tropes, however, there is a piercing insecurity that is all too familiar. As parents increasingly obsess about their children's futures, free play and unstructured activities have become luxuries that few families think they can afford. Listening to Kate's voice, it isn't hard to hear, underlying the brittle self-confidence, a large dollop of fear. Like so many parents, Kate is so terrified of failing her children that she seems to have a hard time balancing in the need for fun.
Similarly, Kate's treatment of Jon, while painful to watch, is only a slight exaggeration of the dominant social perception of men. She seems to see her husband as an incomplete, emotionally-stunted, lump, the final child in her program: Kate Plus Nine. While Kate's condescension toward Jon is often hard to stomach, it becomes much easier to understand if one mentally replaces him with Homer Simpson, Kevin James, Peter Griffin, or almost any other father figure on television today. The cultural touchstones for confident, intelligent, hard-working fathers are few and far between, and Kate's misandry is all too familiar.
It isn't hard to see why this house of cards has come crashing down. In a culture that downplays masculine worthiness and demands perfection from children, most moms probably feel a pressure to become Kate. The problem is, however, that many of these assertions are fundamentally wrong. Parents don't have to be perfect. Men aren't completely useless. Children and their caregivers are allowed to just have fun. Until these simple truths regain cultural relevance, however, Kate Gosselin will be a realistic -- if perhaps slightly outsized -- depiction of the genuine problems facing every mom.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 11)
7-02-2009 @ 9:25PM
shelby said...
very astute article. thank you. i have never seen the gosselins' show, and i have no intention of starting now nor do i aspire to be kate gosselin-like in any way. i have heard enough about them to last a lifetime and, frankly, feel rather sympathetic toward jon.
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7-06-2009 @ 7:02AM
lindak said...
If you've never seen the show, how can you know if the article is "astute"? Anyone who can cope as well as Kate G. with 8 children is ok in my book. Any of you stop to think why she is willing to accept freebies? Any of you stop to think what it will cost and -all at once - to send twins and then eight at the same time to college? I choose to believe them when they say they have socked away money for the kid's futures. Some call her controlling. You are darn right - how else to keep order and sanity in a house with that many kids of a young age?
7-06-2009 @ 8:20AM
ylpatriot said...
Don't feel sorry for Jon... he really is a lump of do nada....he actually turned over the reins to Kate as if to say ... i don't want to have be in charge of anything ... And he does NOT work .. so again ..... please do not feel sorry for him and being lazy ....
7-06-2009 @ 8:30AM
Bette said...
I can totally sympathize with Kate. Sometimes a spouse forces you to become a force. Jon is just such a person - lame, no motivation, no education. I had three kids, went to school and worked full-time. I would come home to find my husband sleeping on the couch telling me he worked hard and was entitled to a nap. To what was I entitled? Now, after 25 years of marriage, he is much more helpful but I still have to tell him where everything is in the kitchen. Jon is the same way. Without being instructed you should know to do lunch, when to put a child's hat and gloves on and keep the rhythm of the home so that the children have structure. Kate doesn't need another child Jon. Grow the hell up!! And that comment you made on the show - "I'm still young and I have my life ahead of me." - Well why didn't you think of that before you started breeding? Now Kate will be stuck and you still will be stupid and unambitious but will be partying with every slut you see in a bar!!!
7-06-2009 @ 11:29AM
Kali said...
Make no mistake, when Jon married Kate, she was already a pain in the ass, she didn't just become one today. Jon can't get out of his own way and he has let Kate make all the decisions since day one. Now he is excited about his new life? Jon, your an big fat whiney baby butt. You don't get to start dating other women because your sick of your life with your wife and kids. What the heck would happen if every mother in this world got sick of being a mom and wife? Are you kidding, I get tired of being a wife and mother, that doesn't give me the right to dump all my responsibilities on someone else. Finish the JOB that YOU started! I hate people like this, dump YOUR crap on someone else, because you don't feel like doing it anymore. GROW UP!
7-06-2009 @ 12:05PM
Ashley said...
Kate is bossy and condescending at times to Jon but he would be a lifeless bum if she wasn't. He always said that. He said he couldn't get motivated without her. She is working her butt off to take care of all of those kids and I would do the same thing if I had to. She isn't unflawed but we are all human.
7-06-2009 @ 12:33PM
renee said...
I just have to say , my self i use too watch it but now no thanks, and i too feel bad for jon, he was worth more that she ever gave him , and to say enough is enough.
7-06-2009 @ 1:04PM
Jeff said...
I agree with you. The commercials are enough to keep me from watching. Why should I feel sorry for someone whose only qualification to make real money is giving birth to 6 kids. It' s been done before.
7-06-2009 @ 1:25PM
js said...
I agree this was a very good article,so true of "today"
I wish more people would read this...
7-06-2009 @ 1:27PM
Ashley said...
Lindak is exactly right. If Kate didn't take rein of the household, the kids would run wild and Jon would sit back on his butt. It can't be easy with 8 children but I think that Kate is doing a fantastic job. Kate may have let the money and fame get to her a little bit, but that's no excuse for Jon cheating and deciding to divorce Kate and move in New York. Jon obviously just wants an easy way out. She has always been the domineering type and Jon knows it. Now he's just deiciding that he is "too young for this" and wants to act like a 20-something year old again. You go Kate!!
7-02-2009 @ 9:25PM
goldy said...
yeah they really have thier kids in mind here. Jon is coming out wiht a seething book against kate and she is just plain rude anyways, Glad to see that show go
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7-06-2009 @ 8:03AM
DOri said...
I think the treatment of Kate Gosselin has been horrible. What we see in the media is not reality but the reality of the TV producers to get ratings.
I do watch the show and I have seen Kate's behavior towards her husband and you know what I can empathize. I only have 1 child but I still get very little support from my husband with the day to day things plus I work full time from home. I cannot begin to imagine what have 8 children would be like. I imagine you have to be organized and a good planner or chaos would ensue.
Bravo to Kate for stepping up where her husband perferred to sit back and play the victim. I think most people, women and men, don't like to see a strong female personality succeed. Look what happened to Hillary Clinton, thrown under the bus by her own party for the lesser of two evils.
I think we should allow John and Kate the time to get through this divorce and regroup their lives. What a hateful race we are when tearing others down becomes a past time.
7-06-2009 @ 11:07AM
LampShade7 said...
i agree with you...everyone is saying poor kate and she is making herslef look like the victim and yes sometimes jon does act like a baby but...kate is just nasty to him. she needs to get off her high horse and realize that she has eight little people that she has been neglecting for her own selfish needs and beauty...stop the show!!!!
7-02-2009 @ 9:44PM
Linda said...
I can only hope the J&K show will fold. I am boycotting TLC until that happens and several others I know are doing the same. I only watched a few episodes and Kate made me so uncomfortable with her "me, mine" attitude, I just quit. I'll bet, tho, that TLC will bring the show back, at least to test it out. I can only hope people just won't tune in and the ratings will sink.
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7-06-2009 @ 8:07AM
kayla said...
thats completely rude of u 2 hope the ratings stink!!!!! Out of the money they make out of the show that goes towards their kids! Would everyone just leave them alone??!!
7-06-2009 @ 9:12AM
Val said...
Gee Linda, are you perfect? Have you ever wanted anything for yourself? It's a dog eat dog world out there and Kate, although she may seem selfish and domineering, is fighting to keep order in her life with 9 other family members to support. I only have 2 kids and my husband was a lot like Jon when they were small. Even today I say he lives like he is only semi-conscious. While working 30 hours a week at a job where I communted; I took the kids to day care, I did all the cooking, laundry, cleaning, shopping, etc.... He got to float in at 7:00pm to a cooked meal, clean house, and clothes folded and back in the drawer. Walk a mile in my shoes and then understand when someone like Kate wants something for herself it is perfectly justified!
7-06-2009 @ 9:49AM
alice said...
take the show of the air ,thier showing us thier dirty laundery ,and your right on jon take of the studs and wear your hat visor front ---------your not in your 20s anymore jon .maybe he cant grow,and kate ses and feels that,and lets see if jon and kate can take care of thier own kids instead using nannies
ok maybe just one nanny she does have tdo make up,boy what pain that must be---------i can hear the kids now mommy-mommy--------- dont boher me now i am doiing make up.
please bring back the real (TLC)
7-06-2009 @ 10:11AM
Carol said...
I feel the same way about TLC. The show has gone off the mark of reality tv. When it became the Jon & Kate "Celebrity Hour", and Where else can you send us" hour it became over indulgent. TLC showed the all to american reality.. GREED! Kate ran with it! It was sickening. I have discontinued watching the show and anything else that TLC represents.
7-02-2009 @ 9:47PM
California granny said...
At long, long last someone can see other side and not just Kate bashing, bashing, bashing. I was a mother of 3 small ones too and know first hand how hard the rearing 3 individuals can be. Kate has 8 and it is not easy. Her mommydom is not that bad as some suggests. In fact she has been doing better than so many other mothers I have seen of just one in their child rearing ways.
Jon has no ambition and Kate has felt it is on her shoulders and have said so too. Jon have had his own agenda from the word go and has finally taken his life in his own hands to elsewere. So, he does not want to continue the marriage, but only wants his freedom like a frat boy he thinks he is. Shame on him. It takes a man to stand up to his own and apparently Jon dos not have guts. I sure have no respect for him at all. Meanwhile his kids are going to have a part time dad that comes and goes when he feels like it. What a joke of a father.
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7-02-2009 @ 11:14PM
Jay said...
As I understand it, Jon and Kate have had a whole troop of people helping out behind the scenes. They are not rearing those kids on their own, as the show would have you to believe.
I remember seeing the show for the first time a couple of years ago before the negative rumors began, and I was not impressed with either one of them; they rarely ever smiled, not around each other, not around the kids; they seemed so unhappy. Now, that culminated unhappiness has bubbled to the surface. I hope that the parents don't continue on with the show, for that really does cross into exploitation.
I liked TLC when it was actually "The Learning Channel"...what are we learning?