Is there really no thread about the Gosselins of John and Kate Plus Eight?

How is this possible?

I, for one, have always been freaked out by this show, freaked out by Kate, and very, very concerned for the children.

What say you all?

DISCLAIMER: I will totally understand if this thread goes nowhere.

I, for one, have always been freaked out by this show, freaked out by Kate, and very, very concerned for the children.

Yep!

u know, all of a sudden she's everywhere.

i had no idea who she was. i guess i don't like flip channels enough.

she looks like a monkey kind of, and family reality shows are fucked.

Her hair is what really frightens me.

I know a couple named Jon and Kate. They have heard of this show.

The main thing I have ever known/noticed about this show is that Jon is apparently not allowed to speak. There are long interview sections where she talks and talks and then he starts to mention something and she yells at him. I have even seen one bit in which he's not speaking at all and she turns and yells at him for breathing too distractingly while she speaks. Mostly he seemed to have developed this completely checked-out unmoving blank stare into the distance.

So when whatever news occurred re: his cheating on her, I must admit that I was like one billion percent unsurprised

legally speaking, putting kids on a show like this might be "okay", but ethically i think it's scraping the bottom of the barrel

http://i39.tinypic.com/sbpibq.jpg

http://blog.imperfectparent.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/09/gosselin_mom_sm.jpg

umm that's kind of mesmerizing, but their body language is weird or something

XP

http://www.babble.com/CS/blogs/famecrawler/2009/05/kate-gosselin-b2.jpg

I can only manage to watch the summaries of this on the various Soup, Dish, etc. shows.

But then again I'm ADDICTED to Real Housewives Of New Jersey

I watched this show until the middle of last season when I couldn't take it anymore. John maybe made some questionable "choices" in the bars sans-wedding ring, but for season after season I feel like Kate has become more obsessive, controlling and abusive. And in the midst of this John quits his job, which I think is a key factor in all of this. He goes from being mr. IT with a career coming home to his family and making a TV show to being all about the TV show while mom goes and travels around to promote books, then she comes home and yells at him for breathing wrong.

The guy is like, younger than me. I'm just saying I empathize. And for a few seasons, he was a very likeable guy. Pretty funny and down to earth.

Except when they start talking about Jesus and teaching the kids about 9-11 so they understand why we're in Iraq.

And if we really want to dish...in the early seasons Kate's brother and sister-in-law would come over and help with the kids and help with home projects and such, then they suddenly disappeared. Word was that Kate didn't think they should get paid for their time on the show. Now they're going to the tabloids saying the kids are being exploited.

The whole thing is fucked but kinda amazing it a post-modern/reality sense regarding the fact that we've all watched this family fall apart. Not some contrived Bachelor bullshit or anything, but real people you've been following for however many years, going through this on TV.

Anyway, they say they're doing it for the sake of the children...I know 8 college funds can be a lot, but you'd think they have enough money now. For the children they should now maybe experience what it's like to not have a camera around, and for the sake of their children, their marriage and other family relationships, they really should just end it asap, because it's just rubber-necking from now on...

My mom is way into this show (I've never seen it) and she talks about it all the time. I started to see them on the covers of all the supermarket tabloids and figured she'd be all bummed but she's actually more into the cheating scandal shit than she ever was into the plain old "oh crap we've got tons of babies" angle. Knowing my mom this shouldn't have surprised me.

Yeah, I was getting my haircut the other day and the lady cutting hair next to me said that Kate's hair has "reached Jennifer Aniston level" in terms of people walking in off the street and requesting it. Egads.

http://www.cockatoos-training.com/z_images/cockatoo_3.JPG

I only watch TLC's midget shows - The Little Couple, etc.

^^ its good to have standards

x-post - There is more than one midget show?

I've only seen seen a couple episodes of this show but those freaking kids, my God they're adorable.

That lady's hair is pretty scary and confusing though.

That hair looks really expensive. All the office ladies are wearing it.

I was getting my haircut the other day and the lady cutting hair next to me said that Kate's hair has "reached Jennifer Aniston level" in terms of people walking in off the street and requesting it. Egads.

So sick and wrong.

It's awful. What is that spiky crap at the back?

hair

but but . . . WHY?! It's disturbingly bad.

my 6th grade math teacher had hair like that, in 1995

Yeah - it's very mid-90s.

http://www.mtv.com/content/ontv/movieawards/2008/images/flipbooks/2008-red-carpet/christian-soriano-55038844.jpg

http://www.retroland.com/retrotalk/userfiles/oldmikescore.jpg

it's like those two hairstyles had a baby that ran away from home and is currently squatting on Kate's head

It would be awesome if Kate ran off with Mike Score.

That would be a great reality show: awful hair and clown sex.

This might be the end result:

http://bp0.blogger.com/_xd9TCSIbfMY/R-GDIzeCGfI/AAAAAAAAA4U/m46Zf_LTpt0/s400/ronald-mcdonald-is-arrested-in.jpg

If that is a clown car and she has 8 kids, then, hold on, I don't understand the internet meme anymore.

(just in case)

http://i44.tinypic.com/i74vnp.jpg

totally unsurprised that this lady's greed to have as many kids as possible also manifests as greed for money and control. congrats on being paid to be totally awful parents, would that other bad parents had the opportunity

The most remarkable thing about the show is watching the mounting resentment and hatred John develops for Kate as the series progresses; IIRC the show started out with her edited in a sympathetic light but that changed pdq.

Wait until you find out about Octomom's reality show. (the octuplet lady who wants to look like Angelina Jolie)

yeah, we know; Kate's already badmouthing her and Nadia is firing back etc etc barf

Octomom is a completely different personality disorder imo

narcissistic vs dependent, imo

one is "acceptably" crazy, one if "point and laugh" crazy.

this woman doesn't seem like as big a bitch as everyone claims she is to me. can you imagine having eight kids? we have one and act like bigger assholes that these people (okay we don't cheat on each other, but still).

than. than these people.

It's not a 24/7 webcam, it's a TV show - program makers choose what to show and how. Viewers all think they have their opinions, but based on what? (this is true about everything on TV, including politics, obviously, but we all forget this all the time)

if i know anything the field producers are really "befriending" them both and getting them to confide, probably providing them with a little free alcohol as well to loosen them up, and then editing it to make them look a little worse or--if the story calls for it--a little better than they are. still, oughta be a law about putting kids on reality tv shows. as in, don't do it.

this woman doesn't seem like as big a bitch as everyone claims she is to me. can you imagine having eight kids? we have one and act like bigger assholes that these people (okay we don't cheat on each other, but still).

I could understand a couple with eight (or fewer) children being mutually cranky and short-fused and impatient with one another, but seriously, so far as I can tell this dude is barely allowed to speak? She will be telling a long story about something that happened to him and then bar him from contributing. I don't know their lives or where that comes from or anything, but that has gotta be a pretty pits-y level of a relationship when you just stare at a wall like you're repressing thoughts of strangling your wife and then she's like GOD do you have to breathe so loud over there

She has her own page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kate_Gosselin
but his redirects to the show's page http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jon_Gosselin

that is symptomatic of our culture's diminishing respect for the role of fatherhood that Dan Quayle warned us about

or possibly not

It's (adjective) that the dogs are full family members on Wikipedia, though.

totally unsurprised that this lady's greed to have as many kids as possible also manifests as greed for money and control. congrats on being paid to be totally awful parents, would that other bad parents had the opportunity

In her defense, they had twins, then thought they'd have 1 more, then fertility drugs went crazy. At least thats what the old opening titles said.

nabisco, this arrangement is called "marriage".

he never actually looked pissed off to me. granted I haven't seen the show in the past year, I guess, but he just seemed like someone who is not as talkative as his wife.

Also in their defense, I don't even really consider 8 kids to be some kind of absurdly large family -- obviously the hook here is that they're all so close together, but in terms of just numbers it's ... uncommon but totally normal

haha akm I am totally imagining your wife tricking you by slipping "silence" among the vows

http://www.inquisitr.com/wp-content/president-kate-gosselins-haircut.jpg

http://www.inquisitr.com/24997/what-would-you-look-like-with-kate-gosselins-haircut

In her defense, they had twins, then thought they'd have 1 more, then fertility drugs went crazy. At least thats what the old opening titles said.

They had to know that multiples were a possibility, esp. since they had two the first time.

not understanding the pass being given for their having 8 kids, yes kids add stress but I'm sure the (behind the scenes) multiple nannies & housekeeper & organic chef probably makes it a lot easier. for all the inevitable editing of reality footage into storylines, the way they airbrush out the 'help' is probably the most egregious abuse of it. hooray for normalizing a completely false representation of parenthood

8 kids seems like a lot of kids and not really normal, unless you're Catholic and or live in Utah

and yeah putting them on TV is a crime

i havent seen every episode of the show, but most of the ones i've seen have focused on all of the people in their life that help them out on a daily basis. most of them are friends, from what i've seen.

yeah my mom had 7 but over a span of 17 years so

i guess 8 kids all close to the same age all at once is what's really freaky about this--it would totally be different if their ages were spread out

her hair is like a posh bob (graduated bob?) gone extreme and wrong; alternately, it's the posh bob as radically reinterpreted by a mall supercuts stylist

I'd say it's the latter.

a blended bob

Blob?

it's one of the most thoroughly graceless hairdos i've seen in a long time -- the front is just a big unlayered chunk! god it's revolting.

her "before" pic makes her look like a lifetime villain

I am grossed out that people see that and think that they must have that haircut as well!

basically proof that you could put any old piece of shit on television and ppl would attempt it in real life

that makes me sad for ppl

http://www.artybees.co.nz/bizarre-book-images/past-their-expiry-date/hair-care-eek-1.jpg

Kate's next hairstyle

it is a backwards mullet

it is a bird of paradise

http://www.smh.com.au/ffximage/2005/11/03/bird_wideweb__430x327,0.jpg

(yeah, Que, exactly, it's the age buildup that's the thing -- NB lots of people are Catholic! or just large-familied, but more in an every-other-year-from-22-to-34 kind of way, so that the last one shows up in high school and the teachers are like "after you we're finished, right?")

WTF?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quiverfull -> purpose: outbreed the nonchristians!

(not saying the Gosselins are, but they do call their kids "blessings" as well)

Never even heard of this show.

That wikipedia article references it, but Ch3ryl L1nds3y Seelh0ff published a really good article in Off Our Backs magazine about her experience in the Quiverfull movement that is really worth reading. There's a link to her blog, on which she posts some excerpts/truncated versions of the article, at the end of the wiki page.

I love how all the people on the "list of adherents" on the Wiki page are men (except M. Duggar).

spoke to a friend who works in reality TV and has crossed path with people who have worked with them and he said that the kids say "we want a normal life".

Not that they would know what a normal life is, or that a normal life means smaller house and no paid-vacations to fun places every wekk.

a good family friend works in post production at the show and says that the tabs have been getting it more or less right--kate is a controlling bitch, john is passive and weak--and the relationship has been crumbling since the start of the show

(not saying the Gosselins are, but they do call their kids "blessings" as well)

I think parents always say that if they have any trace of christianity in their heritage. I mean, I say that about my kid, and I'm no evangelical, and most parents I know have used that word, and none of them are evangelicals either, and many of them are jewish. so, you know.

Parents should refer to their children as their "castigations".

major announcement next Monday or something - anyone care?

http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20286339,00.html

Yeah, heard about this. Word is he picked a 1 bedroom flat in Trump Tower something or other? About 3000 dollars per month. Where is he putting all the kids? In the hallway?

I call'em my little spermjobs. Well, uh, not jobs as they were fun to make.

I have heard of this couple - mostly on gossip sites and the adultry part. Her hair just freaks me out. I'm completely mesmirzed to the point I can only stare at her spiky hair. I simply refuse to believe that people actually ask for this haircut. It has got to be a joke, right? Right? Please say I'm right.

You're right, except for celebrities.

http://photos.momlogic.com/gallery-images/2009/05/david-beckham_full.jpg http://photos.momlogic.com/gallery-images/2009/05/boyle_full.jpg http://photos.momlogic.com/gallery-images/2009/05/pittjolie_full.jpg

And pets.

http://www.chicmother.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/ohmy.jpg

S'over.

lol @ jon: "there are soldiers dying in iraq and people are worried about what i eat for lunch this is what our society has come to blah blah blah"

hey ace no one made you sell out your family for $75 grand/hour fuck you forever jackass.

yeah fuck them both imo

RIP they died young

only know about this shit from the issues of US Weekly at the lady's, but the "fuck these scumbags" assessment sounds abt right.

This is a sincere question - what criteria do people use to determine which of these type of shows are good vs. bad?

what a disaster for plus eight

stupid assholes, would you rather go 2 against 8 or 1 against 8? they totally don't understand this game.

i think you don't understand, ed--for the adults it's too late for happiness, but the kids are definitely going to lose.

This is a sincere question - what criteria do people use to determine which of these type of shows are good vs. bad?

Depends on who you mean by "people" -- this particular people has thought all of these things were endtimes bullshit since the first episode of The Real World started 17 years ago. So yeah, fuck these two pimps.

sincere answer: i think this show is "good" to ppl because jon got busted by the paparazzi and due to kate's v. public transformation from dumpy mom to crazy, pitiful celebritard. kate's gotten the worst by far in the press but she basically seems like a confused person who needs some counseling and a lifetime away from television. tbh jon's stoned fratboy detachment seems a lot more sinister.

xp WmC: people that watch reality tv. I think it's Videodromian exploitation minus the violence predicted by that Cronenberg movie, and can't stand to watch it (not the Cronenberg movie, reality tv).

wait I thought the kids losing was the going-in proposition here

xp

This is a sincere question - what criteria do people use to determine which of these type of shows are good vs. bad?

I watch a shitload of reality tv but this show does not interest me.

I think it's a hit because regular folks like nodding knowingly at the trials and tribulations of marrieds raising kids. For a person like me who does not find that lifestyle at all appealing, I can't switch the channel fast enough.

Also, people love judging other people, so when it turned into a soap opera, people lost their shit.

Is the general reaction now essentially men ("she's impossible!") vs. women ("he cheated!")?

i dunno, i think both of them are retarded. he's an emotional stone and she's a famewhore. their kids are adorable though

what a disaster for retardation

at least one of these kids is gonna be fucked for life b/c of this show, i guarantee it

odds are pretty good

another kid will become an ilx regular

same kid probably

what a disaster for ilx

it's too bad that the announcement wasn't that the show was being transitioned to "burt_stanton & captainlorax plus eight"

So, when does the new Who'll Be The New Daddy show start?

I was only intererested in the first Reality shows because the participants were so oblivious to the effects. I remember watching the first edition of Big Brother (in Belgium) and they were so naive about it all.

Yeah, the initial Real World was similar, if I remember correctly (it's been a while). It wasn't so filled to the brim with nihilism and people convinced that they deserved to be famous for existing.

Which is worse, having parents who are too attentive, or parents who are too distracted and/or busy? I had the latter, we turned out pretty well, it means you have to mature early instead of feeling babied and coddled. I strongly disapprove of corporal punishment though.

I think it depends on the kids. Some kids need to be given a little rope, and let swing or figure out how to reel themselves in. This was what worked for me - I'm a pretty hard-working, self-sufficient guy when left to my own devices, and my parents let me figure things out.

Some others, however, need a lot more attention.

I'm really hoping that Jon and Kate are able to at least function as individuals to raise their kids, and not just flip out and leave the kids in the lurch. I mean, I know some children of divorce who went through a hellish few years while their recently-split parents figured out how to work the new situation. I can only imagine that given these two's apparently fucked attitude towards everything, including each other, and the fact that there are EIGHT KIDS THAT NEED TO BE RAISED, that at least a few of them are going to need some serious counseling in the future.

And yes, Kate is a celebretard.

divorce on kids is rough enough (i would know!) but imagine it being played out on national tv. i wonder if this might not be a good idea, hmmm.

http://www.joeydevilla.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2008/08/think_of_the_children.jpg

Unhhhhh this show suuuuuuucks.

I take it this, from CNN.com, is not a screenshot of the actual announcement?

http://i40.tinypic.com/v6huvp.png

http://www.blogcdn.com/www.tmz.com/media/2009/06/0625_gosselin_ginsburg_exd.jpg

technically shouldn't he be dead then

also why does he dress like a 15 yo

Dress for the job you want, not the job you have.

genuine lols

That shirt is the worst shirt.

irreconcilable fashion choices

So he's going to start hosting a diner food show on the Travel Channel?

Best daddy in the world cap?

... and all he got was this t-shirt.

I didn't know who Ed Hardy was until a few weeks ago, and now I wish I could return to those idyllic times....

god i would enjoy kicking his ass.

ed hardy? i don't think he's a real person

he was a real person, a real tattoo artist who probably hates the people who wears the clothes that bears his name, but doesn't mind the money.

I had no idea.

That's weird, someone told me he was a graffiti artist. She probably just got confused between her transgressive art forms.

He is a great tattoo artist too. His clothing is unbelievably ugly.

not his clothes, this french designer licensed the "name" and makes those terrible, terrible clothes that makes me long for the glory days of "Von Dutch"

It would be pretty cool if Jon just started getting tons of real barbed wire tattoos now without the kids

It would be cooler if he got beaten to death in a bar fight.

why would it be "cool"

swinging arms creating a breeze

Plus he's got an extremely punchable face. It'd be "cool" if it punched more.

I saw a lady with the Kate haircut in a car next to me on the expressway this morning. I had the urge to run her off the road.

He DOES have an extremely punchable face, doesn't he? Smug is too tame a word.

And that Ed Hardy shirt just gets uglier and uglier. Ug.

you guys are bizarre

I don't watch the show, jeff, so I'm not invested in not seeing dude with a punchable face and who is sponsored by an ugly clothing company not get beaten in a bar fight.

not

so many violent people in san francisco

It's true.

can someone check to see if jeff (lowercase j) is sockpuppet

can someone beat me to death in a bar fight

i'm the smug guy wearing affliction brand clothing

Kate in blue bikini on her driveway : I'm sticking with my prediction that the show will turn into a "who'll be the new daddy" thing. If they can't think of anything even lower, that is.

Jeez - it's just a parent spanking her kid. But no, Front Page News!

http://whybenormal.today.com/files/2009/06/kate-gosselin-spanking-leah.jpg

ts: ed hardy vs affliction

ps still gazing in wonder at The Shirt. Does it have cunning faux sleeves or is it, like a set?

It looks like the red sleeves are sewn in...I'd imagine...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQ4wy6-Rt7w&

http://i187.photobucket.com/albums/x311/vainilla_sky/ontd/jon-gosselin-new-nanny-02.jpg

I'll bet he's a cool dad. You know he's gonna let those kids drink on their monthly visits.

He just looks like a complete douchebag.

He looks like he's about three sad steps away from becoming a Juggalo.

he looks like a tub of lard

I can't even handle this asshole. I've never watched the show btw but he's everywhere now since the divorce and just looks like a bigger asshole with every single picture:

Vroom vroom here comes the douchemobile:

http://i26.tinypic.com/125krko.jpg

even though I don't watch the show anymore and he's got some annoying christian/patriotic republican ideas going on, I will defend him again. On the show he was often funny while his wife was shrill and emasculating. He lost his 20s to 8 kids and reality TV and now he's like "fuck it, permanent spring break".

on the other hand...

http://community.livejournal.com/ohnotheydidnt/38038875.html

Vroom vroom here comes the douchemobile:

Thank you. I had a nice fit of childish LOLs at that. :)

I only read the Story Highlights and that was enough to know I didn't want to read the rest.

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/SHOWBIZ/08/10/kate.gosselin.ring/index.html

yawn

http://www.thehollywoodgossip.com/2009/08/jon-gosselin-goes-off-on-kate-police-called/

I can't find a better thread to post this in and didn't think it merited a new thread, but holy shit: the Octomom Special on Fox was really something.

Thread rename request?

Kate Plus 8

http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/theampersand/archive/2009/09/29/kate-plus-8-jon-gosselin-exits-reality-show.aspx

But of course:

“Jon Gosselin unequivocally believes that his children's continued participation in your client's television production is detrimental to his children,” Heller wrote to TLC in a letter obtained by “ET.” “Accordingly, Jon expects that your client will cease and desist from any and all further production which includes his eight children."

Oh for dumb.

wtf is wrong with people btw?

http://www.cnn.com/2009/SHOWBIZ/TV/10/28/jon.gosselin.girlfriend/index.html

They must have crystal meth in the water or something.

http://i.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2009/SHOWBIZ/TV/10/28/jon.gosselin.girlfriend/story.jon.gosselin.mantrum.gi.jpg

"Spiders! Aiiigh! Get 'em off me get 'em off me!"

I thought the revive would be about this.

I am okay with the existence of this show as long as both of them and anyone who watches is sterilized. Or if we can just delete Earth immediately after it's done airing.

'when i love someone i would never hurt them'

no, she'd just go tell the world about what a fuckup they are and air all their relationship dirty-laundry.

Confusing. Can't they all just live in one big house and be like "Jon, Kate, Nadya and Hailey + 22" so I can follow what's going on?

never watched that show but yeah they sure take a lot of place on tv, i managed to notice them too often at any rate and that just motivated me to ask here if anyone caught them when they were just a one shot "soft news" segment one evening? i did and i was like o_0 at them: i remember the girl playfully asking the camera if they wanted to see her stomach, since everybody asked. i was expecting to see "a miracle", but there was no miracle. her stomach was a mad wreck and she was wearing special elastic underpants up to under her breasts to hold that in place. i remember the guy flatly said her body is ruined so sex is over. felt i had to write that, lol. "Our epoch is not very glorious."

'MANTRUMS'

this has really gone too far

http://www.usmagazine.com/uploads/assets/photo_galleries/regular_galleries/372-jon-gosselin-yoga/photos/1257457920_jon-gosselin-4.jpg

http://www.usmagazine.com/uploads/assets/photo_galleries/regular_galleries/372-jon-gosselin-yoga/photos/1257458020_jon-gosselin-6.jpg

http://www.usmagazine.com/uploads/assets/photo_galleries/regular_galleries/372-jon-gosselin-yoga/photos/1257457825_jon-gosselin-2.jpg

How to make an octuplet, part one, stretching?

what

Well done, young grasshopper. (Surely not doing this kind of thing just because he's asian?)

why because he look fat

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NV5kjRj_css

http://i33.tinypic.com/s41hqp.jpg

The Boondock Shits

Man, if Jon could call up Michael Lohan and get all three of them in the room together...

we could, I don't know, flood the room or something

Have them stage No Exit

i just love the look on his face. it says so many things.

"have 8 babies by me, baby, be a multi-millionaire"

this is the only thread on which the "Octomom" was discussed - I just want to say that living with a pregnant lady and seeing what it's like to have one baby inside of you has made me appreciate how fucking insane a person would have to be to want to have EIGHT BABIES inside of them. like, just imagine walking around with EIGHT PEOPLE inside of your body.