{"id":1061,"date":"2009-06-14T12:28:03","date_gmt":"2009-06-14T12:28:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/theirbadmother\/2009\/06\/dear-kate-gosselin-let-me-get-back-to-you-on-that-bad-mother-thing.html"},"modified":"2009-06-14T12:28:03","modified_gmt":"2009-06-14T12:28:03","slug":"dear-kate-gosselin-let-me-get-back-to-you-on-that-bad-mother-thing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/theirbadmother\/2009\/06\/dear-kate-gosselin-let-me-get-back-to-you-on-that-bad-mother-thing.html","title":{"rendered":"Dear Kate Gosselin: Let Me Get Back To You On That Bad Mother Thing"},"content":{"rendered":"

So I wrote a post the other day, continuing my ruminations on Kate Gosselin<\/a> and why she is  so judged and why that’s a problem for me and for everyone, et cetera<\/i>, but it was – as a few readers pointed out – incomplete and unclear. In raising the question of whether or not a recent incident – denying her daughter water, while enjoying a drink herself – warranted judgment, and admitting that I myself had raised my eyebrows and had one of those moments of oh, dear<\/i> – which, as I’ve admitted, are moments that I do have, privately, and I think we all have, privately – but not pursuing those questions to a conclusion, or even taking the time to situate those questions within the context of the larger problems about bad mother narratives that I’ve been pursuing so ardently<\/a>, I did the subject and my readers a disservice. The post as it stood could have been read as ambiguously judgmental; worse, it could have been read as a simple statement of judgment. And although I emphatically did not intend it to be that – there were larger questions, deeper issues, fueling my scattershot reflections – I understand that it could have been read that way, and so I have taken it down until I can pursue those questions to something approximating a conclusion. <\/p>\n

Because although I believe that judgment is unavoidable, that to judge is to be human, and that there are some things that we should judge (another topic for another time), I don’t believe in contributing to – I don’t want to contribute to – public narratives of judgment, and if even one reader took my reflections as simple statements of public judgment, then that’s a problem.<\/p>\n

I’ll repost the original, unedited, when I take up the topic again. But for now, if there’s any room for misunderstanding, I’m taking it down.<\/p>\n

In the meantime: BABIES IN BATHING SUITS, for everyone’s amusement and edification…<\/p>\n

\"tanis<\/a><\/span>Because nobody ever judges a baby. Babies are beyond judgment<\/i>.<\/p>\n

Um, right?<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So I wrote a post the other day, continuing my ruminations on Kate Gosselin and why she is  so judged and why that’s a problem for me and for everyone, et cetera, but it was – as a few readers pointed out – incomplete and unclear. 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