Accurate depictions of motherhood: ur doin it rong. via diana-b. @ flickr

Zurawik’s piece is very short, and asks:

But if June Cleaver represented the passive, repressed, housebound, 1950′s mom, what does Kate represent with her large brood, constant kvetching, passive-aggressive husband and control issues? And if Kate is the paragon of motherhood today, and what does that say about us?

Uh, maybe nothing? Just because a TV show is popular (and is currently receiving tabloid coverage) doesn’t at all mean that it holds some greater truth about what motherhood is. Not to mention, I don’t remember anyone — other than Zurawik — saying that Gosselin is “the paragon of motherhood today.”

Looking to pop culture to provide a model representation of any segment of the human experience is an experiment that will almost always fail, but Zurawik is hardly alone in searching for a paragon of motherhood as he channel surfs. There is a reason that the aforementioned June Cleaver became such an icon, as did Donna Reed. They were followed by Carol Brady in the seventies and Clare Huxtable in the eighties; but then the situation changed when the most popular sitcoms ceased to revolve solely around familial situations.

There were no models of motherhood to be found on Seinfeld or Friends or Cheers, and the most recognizable mother on TV became Marge Simpson. It’s worth noting that the most discussed TV mom in the nineties was Murphy Brown, whose decision to be a single mother generated a firestorm of controversy. In other words, it seemed that we had come a long way since the days of June Cleaver. But was that true? Those fun patriarchal standards of what constitutes a good mother were not about to be eradicated by one television show. The simple fact that the question of who the best TV mom is goes to show that there is still a cultural need to harness that unwieldy being of motherhood into a neat and tidy representation.

The biggest difference between the days of June Cleaver and the days of Kate Gosselin is that TV shows no longer pretend that every mother is content to stay in the kitchen wearing an apron over her perfectly ironed dress. But it’s preposterous to treat Gosselin as if she embodies some larger truth about maternity. To do so would be equivalent to supposing that American Idol is an accurate representation of the music business. The images of all reality TV stars are as carefully managed as those of the actors who star in sitcoms. It’s a safe assumption to say that Jon & Kate Plus 8 strategically edits footage so that the Gosselins’ actions can be projected from whatever angle best serves the producers’ purposes, in which case there is no way that Kate Gosselin can be an unfiltered representation of motherhood.

Is Zurawik alone in thinking that the star of a reality TV show is truly being held up as a paragon of motherhood? I hope so. Not because I have anything against Kate Gosselin — as I said, I’ve never seen her show — but because the need to look to anyone, let alone a woman who’s famous for a reality TV show, to embody modern motherhood is a fallacy. Motherhood is not some monolithic entity that can be represented by any one woman, fictional or not. So Happy Mother’s Day to all, and here’s hoping that, whatever your style of mothering may be, you don’t feel the need to measure yourself against any mom you see on TV.

via rherteux @ flickr

There is one essential problem that I have with the show, and that is its very existence. This is not a blanket condemnation of dating shows, but the fact that The Cougar is based on the fallacy that women have an expiration date, and then turns around and pretends to be making some grand statement about society. The producers are clearly trying to prove that they are doing this in a sly nudge-nudge wink-wink manner, as if to say “Look at how enlightened we are!” But by constantly harping on the woman’s age, whatever larger point they (doubtfully) may be trying to make gets lost amid the half-hearted “age-is-just-a-number-so-stop-focusing-on-it-but-remember-how-awesome-this-show-is-to-have-a-woman-of-a-certain-age” banter between the host, the men, and the cougar herself.

The cougar, if you’re interested, does have a name — not that the producers always seem to think that’s important. Her name is Stacey, but please remember that she is also The Cougar and shall be referred to as such when it pleases the voiceover writers. She’s 40, has four children, and has a job in the real estate profession that seems to have a somewhat nebulous definition. Stacey wants a husband and has taken the perfectly logical step of auditioning twenty men on basic cable television to have the honor of being Mr. Stacey.

It should be noted that Stacey does seem to have a definition of empowerment that is a bit askew from my own, as she says that “it is really empowering to have my choice of twenty men.” Maybe Stacey is of the mind that women’s equality means that a woman can headline a reality TV show that is abso-fucking-lutely fixated on the fact that this is an older woman and thus we can never forget that she is older than the men, not younger, she is older, older, older, older, old. Did I mention the men are younger than Stacey? She is a Cougar, and the viewers will not forget that — in the name of equality! The authoritative voice of host Vivica A. Fox makes it very clear during the premiere episode that nobody cares when older men date younger women, and hence this show will bring balance to that imbalance of the sexes! Except that the whole point of this show is to focus on Stacey’s age and how “daring” this is. Maybe it would be more “daring” to have Stacey starring in a show that does not give a shit about her age, let alone make it the entire basis for the show. By making it The Issue driving the show, the producers fetishize Cougarhood and make it impossible to equate it to the older man/younger woman situation.

The fact is that there is no equation here, no parity between the genders when the significantly older party in a relationship is a man and when it is a woman. For those who think taking offense at the word “cougar” is much ado about nothing, I will repeat my comment on yesterday’s Jezebel post about this phenomenon: Just the fact that we have to give this “phenomenon” a name is ridiculous. What do we call older men who date/marry younger women? Is Michael Douglas a lynx? Is Hugh Hefner a puma? Was Tony Randall a snow leopard? The fact that there’s no corresponding inane term for men just shows that this is something perceived as being outside the norm for women and so there has to be a ridiculous label applied to it.

Now, with that out of the way, I will treat those of you who missed last night’s masterpiece with some epically fantastic cringe-inducing highlights:

- There is a contestant named Colt. A nice young male animal for our female cougar.

- Joe the bartender, who wore a safari hat so he could properly demonstrate that he was hunting for a cougar.

- The contestant who greeted Stacey by saying, “You look way too old to be a cougar.” He meant to say she looks way too young to be a cougar, but whatever.

- The contestant who said, “This is my first cougar experience.”

- The singing contestant who serenaded Stacey with these lyrics: “You like guys under thirty, it doesn’t mean you’re dirty. You like us young and clean, as long as we’re over seventeen.”

- The police officer contestant who introduced himself by saying “You’re under arrest. You stole my heart. You have the right to remain delicious.”

- The bleep-filled exchange between two contestants: an Andy Roddick-doppelganger (who has his own twin as a fellow contestant) and a pretentious twit in an ascot. It started out with them arguing about whether or not “age is just a number” then devolved into the Roddick-doppelganger yelling at the other guy and calling him an “ascot-wearing motherfucker.” Maybe not those exact words, but it was bleepy and he said “ascot,” so I’m sticking with that.

- The contestant who said Stacey was “a grey squirrel I just want to pounce on.” Insert your own “squirrel-and-nuts” joke here.

- The contestant who said “I really hope this cougar likes lamb, because I’m nice and sweet and tender.”

And finally, in what might just be enough to keep me watching this trainwreck…

- The seduction-guaranteed pick-up line: “How’d you like to try an Australian kiss? Like a French kiss, only down under?”

Meow indeed! Now excuse me, ladies. I am going on the prowl for my own tender lamb.

via kayleigh jane @ flickr