Churchhoney

I've been warned that you can even trigger respiratory issues in some kids by dressing them too warmly, so you need to check carefully for overheated babies just as much as checking to make sure they're warm enough. There's a fine line between using clothing to keep a kid's warmth contained and containing so much of the warmth that they overheat and start sweating or overbreathing to compensate. And there are hats and there are hats. That doesn't look like any indoor hat to me, unless you've got a really cold house.

Well, what the hell are women good for if we can't get things like this right? We certainly have no other functions on this earth ... Other than lugging and ejecting our men's offspring during those first nine months, of course. But that's just temporary and no inconvenience since we carry 'em inside.

Yeah, that was a mess all right. I’m still skeptical that that level of price change is really warranted, though. I’ve watched a lot of people take mainly-cosmetic changes to be something much more substantive than they actually are and pay a high price because the windows and the kitchen counters look nice, while not even noticing big issues. That house still has its same location and, for the most part no doubt, the exact same underlying structure and bones that it had before the cleanup. And if it’s like many McMansions, its underlying structure has a lot of shoddy crap involved in it. JoyAnna can’t fix that with her broom.

Exactly. The hooks for the original show simply don't exist for this show. And I don't see any way they can really manufacture hooks that would work.

I think the difference between you and me is that you see somebody having their tv show taken off the air as blacklisting. Whereas I see it as just another media decision based on what could be a multitude of reasons – policy, monetary, artistic, philosophical, etc – of which virtually none constitute “blacklisting” since they’re made by private enterprise, not imposed by a government entity that would control your life. In private enterprise, nobody deserves a tv show. And I think a show that pretties up and disguises misogyny and spiritual and psychological violence against young people is as good a candidate for pulling as any. And I guess the other difference is that you think things will be worse for the Duggar kids if they’re off tv. Whereas I think that’s the only way things can possibly get better for them. No older kid will ever dream of leaving while the TLC teat remains to be sucked on. And leaving is the only thing that can save them. And in my opinion, the tv show encourages one of the worst and most damaging behaviors of JB and M – continually pushing their kids to lie about and totally falsify their lives so the TeeVee can depict the Duggar life as the world’s ideal. Much less motivation for these two creeps to do that if the show is gone. JB and M are getting too old to whip with rods very much these days. And the kids are no longer babies. Now most of the young’uns remaining have probably not been whipped much to date, and if the ‘rents start it now, many are big enough to fight back. And since it would be a relatively new thing, they probably would. It’s the fighting back that often stops parents, in these situations. I think the difference between you and me is that you see somebody having their tv show taken off the air as blacklisting. Whereas I see it as just another media decision based on what could be a multitude of reasons – policy, monetary, artistic, philosophical, etc – of which virtually none constitute “blacklisting” since they’re made by private enterprise, not imposed by a government entity that would control your life. In private enterprise, nobody deserves a tv show. And I think a show that pretties up and disguises misogyny and spiritual and psychological violence against young people is as good a candidate for pulling as any. And I guess the other difference is that you think things will be worse for the Duggar kids if they’re off tv. Whereas I think that’s the only way things can possibly get better for them. No older kid will ever dream of leaving while the TLC teat remains to be sucked on. And leaving is the only thing that can save them. And in my opinion, the tv show encourages one of the worst and most damaging behaviors of JB and M – continually pushing their kids to lie about and totally falsify their lives so the TeeVee can depict the Duggar life as the world’s ideal. Much less motivation for these two creeps to do that if the show is gone. JB and M are getting too old to whip with rods very much these days. And the kids are no longer babies. Now most of the young’uns remaining have probably not been whipped much to date, and if the ‘rents start it now, many are big enough to fight back. And since it would be a relatively new thing, they probably would. It’s the fighting back that often stops parents, in these situations.

I suppose you're right. But what the heck will people be watching for? To see a replay of J and J's teary made-for-tv complaints about how the media grievously hurt them by outing the non-event of their molestation? To see Anna make her ugly bad-actor prissy face as she expresses completely unearned shock that the husband she was thrilled to marry as a serial child molester later screwed a sex worker,? And to see all the amazing "milestones" that "change everything" that follow these events -- i.e., the J and J bitchez do something unheard of and truly astonishing on this planet of 7 billion people -- give birth. .... And what "everything" gets changed, exactly? Ben still doesn't have a job. Jill still thinks she's a competent medical professional. And they're all still preaching and hectoring the world about virtue and Jesus while not getting day jobs and hoping to live off the suckaz forevs. I never did get it. And I get it even less now.

See, here's where this argument completely loses me. Bear with me. Why the hell do the Duggars have to be better employed than the rest of the population? Crap jobs -- or hard jobs requiring education and training but with increasingly crappy pay or "contractor" status -- are the norm in today's America. I see no reason why anybody should worry that the Duggars -- who have never made the slightest move to get trained or educated, build a resume or accommodate another person or try to figure out what wanted goods and services they might provide -- would have to take these jobs. The rest of the damned country is supporting its families with these jobs, and that includes many tens of millions of people who are far more deserving of better work than the Duggars because they've made efforts. People are raising their families on fast food jobs. They're raising their families and trying to pay for education on retail jobs. THey're struggling to move up in those crap jobs as high as they possibly can. They're trying to start and sustain home-based businesses using whatever skills they have or can develop -- be they lawn mowing, clothing alterations, chocolate-covered fruit making or whatever. In my opinion, the Duggars should take whatever work they can get -- and they do have that four-generation-old real-estate business that they could work at reviving -- just like anyone else and not be handed a fucking tv show just because .... because what? Because they're the Duggars? Who the hell are the Duggars? I haven't heard a single argument that tells me why the Duggars should be in a different category from everybody else! Because they've come to expect it to be otherwise? Well, so have a lot of people in their 50s who get laid off and find themselves frighteningly hard-to-place-in-a-new-position just at the time they arrived at their supposed peak earning years. After years of, you know, actually learning and working 60-hour weeks with no vacations, not being bankrolled to vacations abroad, getting Apple products for free and living off unearned fame. Those newly unemployed-through-no-fault-of-their-own 50-something folks have to struggle on, despite their expectations. And woe to those who haven't saved some money so they can tide themselves over till they manage a new start. They've got to manage. The fast-food-worker heads of families have got to manage. The Duggars should have to manage, too. Seriously,

Well, if you were a fame whore of Duggar proportions and knew that the persona you already had would be despised by the conservative Christian community anyway, you might well do it. And I think there are probably a lot of people like that! (Oh, and you'd also have to be very very non-squeamish and completely without standards when it came to sex partners. Because Josh.)

It's like naming your kid Spurgeon. It's all about you and your greater glory. While being completely oblivious to the fact that the kid is a person, too. With -- Dog forbid! -- feelings. Of course the Duggar kids don't actually have any friends or acquaintances except a bunch of Gothardite spawn whose parents also treat them like wholly-owned subsidiaries. So I suppose it doesn't matter all that much. Unless they finally get free.

Interesting. Sounds like a mess! .... also sounds like office use might be the best bet for the silly-looking house ....

Thanks. .... I must say I still think it's kind of odd to build a spec house in the middle of a commercial zone. Don't they usually build those on or quite near the residential area that they're planning to develop? Who the heck would want to live in one of those that's right in the middle of commercial properties? It's not like the end result would be a mixed-use semi-urban kind of downtown-but-still-neighborly-community-living arrangement. It'd just be one big house-for-people-who-love-the-exurbs stuck in the middle of a bunch of dentist offices. ... No wonder all the windows were broken. lol

On the Duggars' facing ruination if Josh's antics get them extinguished from the TeeVee (which I don't think they will, but it's been argued that that's the risk...) ... I may be miscounting here, but it seems to me that there are 15 Duggars-and-Duggar-in-laws currently age 18 and over, who at least theoretically could be working for pay. And as far as I know, only one -- Jim Bob -- is certified to be doing so. (Grandma, Jim Bob, Michelle, Josh, Anna, John David, Jana, Derick, Jill, Ben, Jessa, Jinger, Joseph, Josiah, Joy Anna) And while some may be not so eligible for work, I can say that I personally know people who are working for pay (part- or full-time) who are over 70 (heck, even over 80) , mothers of newborns, single mothers of four (and more), and students. Meanwhile, there remain 10 minor Duggars and six minor Duggars-the-next-generation. So I would think that the 15 potentially eligible workers could cobble together some way to support themselves plus the 16 non-eligibles. If they're actually hard up for money, I'd think that the very nearly half of the clan who are theoretically eligible workers-for-pay would be figuring out how to bring some in. They don't seem to be doing so, however. So I'm not convinced they're really in any financial danger at all -- except the danger of having to work instead of being able to grift, scam, exploit their fame, hand out unsolicited advice and preach, freeload and hang around the house all day. And I am way too damn obsessed with these sickening people.

And the $500,000 is just a placeholder and wishful thinking, anyway, is it not? Under the circumstances, I have a hard time seeing a jury (or judge) awarding her that much when she agreed to have sex with the same guy again after this presumed traumatic event. ... I've been on some civil-trial juries with damages involved and the jury doesn't even know what the person is asking for. They decide on the awards entirely on their own. Is it different in Arkansas? I can't see her looking half-a-million worth of sympathetic to a jury, in this case.

The value nearly quintupled in three years? How the heck did that happen? That's quite the little real estate boom .... (And how can I get one of those in my neighborhood?)

So somebody at some point built this big house in a place that was zoned for commercial? Is it just me or is it odd to build a McMansion in a commercial zone? ETA: Sorry. See that's already been asked. And that it's not just me.

I agree that money matters! But how many adults do they have in that household who are now not doing any paying work? JIm Bob could work harder -- he's spawned all these kids, so it's his duty to work! Michelle could work with him -- they could revive and try to grow the real estate business. They did it once! They could encourage John David to get a job that pays instead of having him be a hobby pilot so much of the time. Jana, Jinger, Ben, Josiah, etc., could be encouraged to work outside the home -- or make something or do something that non-Duggars would want to pay for or buy! .... There's no reason that a group of adults that size can't support themselves, especially because they're obviously starting out with a bit of a financial cushion from past earnings! (Jim Bob bought two airplanes in the past two to three years! He's got a bit of cash somewhere!) ETA: (and they shouldn't spend one thin dime on Josh -- although they'll probably need to help Anna out some. Josh needs to go out and get a job in a car wash or whatever, keep his nose clean and work his way up, paying his own way and living within his means. Just like everybody else!)

Well, I think they really are in very bad trouble, and I'm not sure there is a solution. In my opinion, Michelle and Jim Bob have done a number on those kids that some of them -- maybe many of them -- never will be able to recover from. For the older ones, I think the only possibility for improvement is leaving. And I don't think there's a chance in heck that any of them will leave as long as the tv show is there or has any possibility of being there. I truly think that only a money crunch and the complete end to the possibility of tv will alert some of those kids that they have to get out and do something on their own -- and will also possibly push Michelle and Jim Bob into grudgingly allowing it. Because as long as there's the ghost of a chance of a tv show or any media exposure, then they're going to bribe and bludgeon the kids into staying around to help bolster the family image and the kids will do it, both because they're very much controlled by their parents and because they'll have the hope of continued money and perks and, for some of them, the fame that they've come to enjoy and rely on. Then, to me, if some of the older ones actually did leave as the media circus ended, they'd start finding something out about the world beyond the gates. And then there's a chance that they'd start communicating some of that to the younger kids. I do think M and JB are probably a bit worn out as controllers at this point, and I can see them not grasping quite as tightly as they may have in the past to keep the younger kids away from the influence of any older ones who may come to visit with some new ideas. And maybe some of the younger kids could start envisioning a different kind of life for themselves. And envisioning it is at least the start of trying to get it. Unfortunately, I do think it's possible to mess up your children so badly that there's little hope of them ever really recovering. Josh is just an irritant that's truly irrelevant to 99.9 percent of what's gone wrong and is going wrong in that household, to me!

Yeah, see the difference between your view and my view is that, in my view, Michelle and Jim Bob hurt those kids every single day, in multiple ways, and have done since each kid was born. I was raised by people that I think were very similar to the Duggars in some essential ways, so to me they represent a toxicity and spiritual damage that's incalculable -- to every single kid, compounded by every day those kids live with them. To me, all a disgusting stupid brother can add is some bad publicity for the family and the loss of some more money. Josh isn't enmeshed with those kids, brainwashing those kids, depriving those kids of knowledge and opportunity and autonomy when they don't even know it. He isn't convincing them that falsehood in communication, denying all of one's true feelings and manufacturing your life to look good for reality tv are virtues. When those are really things that destroy your soul and your ability to live like a normal human being, possibly for life. It's Michelle and Jim Bob who are doing all that really damaging crap. Meanwhile, Josh is nothing but a jerky passerby who may cost the family some money. And, frankly, if the loss of Duggar money motivated some of the older kids to get the hell out of that household, I'd consider that a great benefit. And if the Josh scandal caused TLC to rethink their obvious plan to continue airing Duggar crap (although it won't, I'm sure), I'd think that was a huge benefit. The sooner they get off tv, the better for all of them, in my opinion. Beyond those external things, Josh has no power to "destroy" the family, in my opinion. The other kids don't seem to have much relationship with him. He doesn't seem to want much relationship with them. It's the people who are enmeshed with you who destroy you, not passersby. Obviously, mileage varies on this.. To me, though, the world vastly vastly underestimates the evil Michelle and Jim Bob have perpetrated on all their kids and continue to perpetrate (along with TLC), and vastly overestimates how much harm can come to a kid from having a brother who slept with a prostitute. When it comes to money loss, for example, if Jim Bob and Michelle don't want to, they don't have to spend another dime on Josh. I fear that they probably will spend dimes, though -- but not because of their love for Josh but for the same reason they do everything -- to protect their "brand" and their ability to make money without working. In my opinion, there really is no reason for them to lose more money due to Josh. And to me the loss of the show wouldn't be the loss of a livelihood -- it'd be the loss of an evil serpent that's done nothing but help JB and M destroy their children!

And ditto most of the rest of the family. Look at the passive aggressive fury that shows up in every damn one of Jessa's social-media posts. And the "sweet" sniping back and forth between her and Jill during the latest baby making period. Etc. This is what Michelle and Jim Bob hath wrought. And it ain't gonna get any better as the good life brought by reality tv slowly recedes from the grasp of the Duggar kids and hardly a one has anything of substance to replace it with, either materially or non-materially. The passive-aggressive Duggar war of the worlds is just beginning.

Too late. Michelle and Jim Bob already destroyed them all. The kids -- and the public -- just don't know it yet.

Unfortunately, since they apparently view all their children (and grandchildren) merely as appendages of themselves, I doubt that this will happen. .... I think this is one of the consequences of their sick enmeshed ownership of their children. They don't really care for them or about them, but they don't view them as having any autonomy either. They exist merely as extensions of the parents' egos. I don't think Jim Bob and Michelle have any idea at all how to treat their children as actual human beings -- or even any idea that it would be important to do so.

Some other dame claimed it a few months ago. her story sank without much of a trace, though -- so far, at least -- so whether it's true, false, accurate or hyped is even more unknown. http://www.ibtimes.com/josh-duggars-reputed-mistress-had-pregnancy-scare-after-unprotected-sex-during-ashley-2080241 http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3221992/Second-mistress-Josh-Duggar-claims-suffered-pregnancy-scare-unprotected-sex-disgraced-star-goes-missing-Christian-rehab-clinic.html

Plenty of evidence suggests that this is one of the strongest shared traits of the Duggar family.

Too bad that, unlike the Sasquatch, Josh actually does exist. ... He's considerably less attractive than the Man-Ape, though, I must say.

I expect he was intimidated by those women. And rightly so. Since I would bet that their contempt for and resentment of him knew no bounds. From his point of view, I'm sure it made much more sense to creep away to somebody in the sex trade for whom his physical attraction could be coupled with contempt from his end so he could smack her around as a way of venting his frustrations at and his disdain for all women (except mommy Michelle, perhaps). And since I'm not one who believes he saw all that many sex workers, I doubt that the money was much of an issue. He was certainly making in the high-five or low-six figures at his DC job, plus whatever they were getting from TLC. So 2100 wouldn't seem like that much, or even be noticed. He and Anna were throwing around plenty on trashy, ego-boosting vehicles, among other things.