[Mama June From Not to Hot: Season 7 Family Crisis]

I stopped watching sometime during the Geno days--did he ever get that cyst taken care of?--and hadn't planned to watch any more.  I saw June being given every chance in the world to clean up her life and become a healthy, kind of normal person, and she just couldn't do it.  Or wouldn't do it.  I think June's delight in life was being shocking and horrible, but I think she also genuinely wanted to stop looking like a giant thumb.  (the creatures in Spy Kids 1 or 2?  she wouldn't need a costume)

I chanced by the show on a surf and saw Anna's cancer turban and watched the first ep of the new season.

How the hell did Alana (apparently, via preview) get a $20,000 scholarship to *any* institute of higher learning, much less a well-respected, *genuine* school?  Did she get good grades in high school?  Wasn't she home-schooled for much of her life?

And I'm sorry, but Alana is still fat fat fat.  Pumpkin seems to have taken some weight off, and June's body is heavy but mostly weirdly-shaped, I guess from surgery.

Alana has a boyfriend with legal troubles, but she is being allowed--apparently--to make his location the deciding factor in whether she's going to go to college or not.  Pumpkin at least got her this far without a pregnancy, and if Pumpkin supervised her education to the point where Alana is college-bound, that's a miracle and stars in Pumpkin's crown.

The best thing in the world would be for Alana to go to school, live in a dorm, eat in the school cafeteria, and make friends with classmates instead of living her life as something to be looked at, judged constantly, and made fun of for her looks, her history, her family and her life.  She needs friends who are unaware of her and her mother's histories.  I'm not hopeful but I'm curious, so I'm going to try to watch this season.  God have mercy on my soul.

[S18.E21: Talk Back Part 2 (Special Episode)]

On 1/2/2024 at 12:21 AM, Gramto6 said:

I think the problem keeping them...anything...straight is they show the same clips over and over and over and over ad nauseam, that we've seen them so much we can't remember where/when it was in context with what is going on now...

I don't know, I'm as confused as all of you are!! 

Me, too.  But you know what?  I love watching them, over and over and over.  I sit there in my recliner, occasionally hitting "rewind" because I can't believe what I just saw/heard.  TLC could make a fortune just replaying these "Look Back" shows for eternity.  I'd watch.  From my Kidney Planet, I'd watch.

[S18.E21: Talk Back Part 2 (Special Episode)]

On 12/30/2023 at 9:36 AM, altopower said:

The whole show was a hoot. We'd seen the original clips before, but watching them respond with laughter and sarcastic comments just made me happy, especially with Robyn pretending she wasn't sitting anywhere near Kody while he slouched and pouted and checked his watch. Methinks his great luv isn't so in luv with him these days.

I think the cruelest (and therefore best) thing the OGs can do to the Dynamic Duo is to laugh at them.  I hope hope hope there's another episode that shows Kidney's reaction to the OGs making fun of him and Crybrows.  The meanest and most effective way to treat a tyrant is to laugh at him.

On 12/30/2023 at 10:17 AM, Gramto6 said:

I'm beginning to think he had snowed CB just as he did the OG3 and she is beginning to see through it. I also believe she entered this family thinking she could take over and be the Queen and everyone would bow to her wants and needs. She didn't enter "innocent" into the family, she had her own motives. Kootie fed into her plan and for a while it looked like it might work, but the deceit has a way of coming out and things exploded beyond Kooties' or Crybrows' wildest imaginations. Their selfishness and overblown egos totally blew up this family.

And don't forget the lure of being on TV as the youngest and fittest of the wives, plus all that easy TLC money.  Poof!  All gone!  The exit of the OGs just screwed CB over good, and she's facing life *legally married* to the biggest ass in town.

Oh, if only she could cry!

[S18.E19: Sister Wives: Talk Back Part 1 (Special Episode)]

Announcement:  I am no longer referring to Kotex as "Kotex."  In my book, he is now and forever Kidney Brown.  Or maybe Knifedkidney Brown.  Nope.  Too long.  Kidney Brown.  Knifed Brown?  No.  Kidney is better.  Kidney Brown.  Rolls off my damn tongue.

Acknowledgments and appreciations to Merry Brown.

Thank you for your kind attention.

Mothra

[S18.E19: Sister Wives: Talk Back Part 1 (Special Episode)]

9 hours ago, General Days said:

 

 

The Brown parents have always indicated, on the show, that they had religious sealings at their "church," and that the ceremonies were secret and sacred. They've said on camera that they wouldn't talk more about their weddings. In other words, they've made no secret of it being secret.

The parents are not mainstream LDS (i.e. they are not part of the mainstream church known as The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints), and they are not part of the FLDS (the Rulon Jeffs/Warren Jeffs group, whose full name is The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints or FLDS for short).

The Brown parents are (or at least were) members of the AUB (Apostolic United Brethren, aka the Allred Group).

 

 

I don't know if the AUB has missionaries now. They didn't used to.

None of the sects that are outside of the mainstream Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is all that big. I'm not sure they'd even have the ability to establish a mandatory missions program.

Regardless, none of the OG13 Brown kids are part of the AUB, or any other fundamentalist Mormon sect, as far as we know. I think perhaps the one benefit the kids realized from being on the show is that they broke free of Mormon fundamentalism.

Certainly none of Meri, Janelle, and Christine's kids are Mormon fundamentalists. I'm not sure about Robyn's kids (although Mykelti and Gwen have seemed to indicate that none of the kids will be involved in polygamy, and the way this was said, it seemed to include Robyn's older kids).

As I understand it (from Gwendlyn and Mykelti's content) the adult kids are a mix of evangelical Christian, mainstream LDS, and agnostic/atheist, with a little bit of paganism.

 

 

I was only talking about the Brown parents' weddings (Kody's weddings to Meri, Janelle, Christine, and Robyn).

The adult children's weddings, featured on Sister Wives, were not AUB weddings, or any kind of Mormon wedding.

They were just "normal American" weddings. No one was being deceitful about that. You took my previous post as saying much more than it did.

 

 

I don't know how else to say that they couldn't have shown the parents' spiritual weddings (sealing ceremonies) on TV. They take place in an Endowment House and are secret ceremonies which are only open to adult, baptized, members in good standing. They cannot even talk about the ceremony on TV. The sect won't let them.

I don't think the goal was ever to demystify polygamy though. I think the goal was to make it look less threatening -- to put another face on it other than the one the Warren Jeffs' FLDS put out, of child brides in prairie dresses. 

They wanted it decriminalized and/or legalized. They didn't care if the rest of America understood it. They cared that they be allowed to practice their brand of the faith, which doesn't include the marriage of minors.

Again, thank you.

I do not recall the Brown parents explaining about their sealings.  I do not have the world's best memory, so I probably forgot, or maybe wasn't watching if it occurred early in the series.  At any rate, you've set me straight, and I feel like I owe Kotex et al. an apology.

Ask me about snake handlers.  That I know about.

[S18.E19: Sister Wives: Talk Back Part 1 (Special Episode)]

1 hour ago, General Days said:

Don't go by the Browns wedding day photos. I don't think that Kody would be photographed in the hat. And he would have been in all white for all of the sealing ceremonies.

LDS and AUB sealings are more or less secret. That's why basically all the Browns have ever said about their wedding ceremonies is that they are different and sacred to them (as if the rest of us don't hold our own ceremonies sacred -- don't get me started).

That video (of an LDS sealing) is the product of hidden camera footage. The wedding photos we have of all the Brown weddings are not from the sealing. They're from their receptions.

No, the brown dress didn't cover her collarbones, but that was just her dress for the big family photo, which was taken on the day of the wedding reception. Neither Kody nor Roby would have been allowed to wear brown (or other non-white colors, other than the green apron) during their sealing.

 

She either wore the white gown (if the AUB allows that) WITH an insert to make the neckline conform to AUB standards, or she wore a temple gown.

They — and all of the people who attended the sealing — would have worn their temple garments (the infamous Mormon underwear) under whatever they wore for the sealing, too. I believe the AUB uses an older style garment than mainstream LDS people now wear. 

I'm unconvinced that Robyn and Kody really had their sealing ceremony on the day the production taped the wedding reception episode. Part of me wonders if they were sealed before she moved to Lehi, or at least as soon after as they could be.

 

Thank you again for all this fascinating information.  It had never occurred to me that post-Merry weddings would have been official Mormon/FLDS ceremonies--sealings--because they all seemed so casual about observing their religion in other ways (did any of the children go away to serve as missionaries, for example?).  What they presented, to me at least, was "normal" American wedding stuff, with the exception of Kotex being the officiant of some services.  How crafty and deceitful of them!  It would have been a simple matter to announce that cameras were not permitted at the "real" Mormon wedding, and then moved on to the reception, which we apparently *were* invited to. 

If the goal was to demystify polygamy, that's another big fail.  Not not showing the ceremony but in trusting the viewer to accept that there is a sacrosanct part of the religion that outsiders are not welcome to participate in.  I think we are adults enough to understand that someone's true religious beliefs might not be something they want on TV, especially since those beliefs or misinterpretation of those beliefs have led literally to people dying in their defense.

I mean, trying to understand how multiple wives work out in real life was enough for me.  I got enough Mormon mysticism from Big Love.  It's where Harry Dean Stanton showed us how to talk to god via a big black hat.

[S18.E19: Sister Wives: Talk Back Part 1 (Special Episode)]

4 hours ago, Orcinus orca said:

No mention of love in the entire service.  Guess that's not a Mormon thing.

Well, see, Kotex didn't promise to *love* them, so he's in the clear, soul-wise.

[S18.E19: Sister Wives: Talk Back Part 1 (Special Episode)]

14 hours ago, General Days said:

Meri made her wedding dress (which I think looks like a professionally made gown, or at least it photographed well).

Janelle (who had been previously married to Meri's brother Adam) wore a dark blue dress to her reception, and Meri and she coordinated their outfits.

Christine's mother, Annie, made her dress, but Anne was being shunned by the Allred family by then (for divorcing the old man and leaving the cult), including Christine. I don't even think Christine went to her mom's place for fittings. Annie could not attend the sealing, because she had left the faith, and I believe she was not included in the reception. (Annie was also heartbroken that her daughter was marrying into a situation she herself had escaped only a few years prior.)

Mormon (both mainstream Latter-day Saints, and the Browns' fundy sect, the AUB) wedding ceremonies are different from mainstream Christian ones. Mormons have their union sealed in the temple, in a ceremony that only other baptized, adult Mormons with Temple Recommends can attend.

I don't know the AUB's specific clothing dictates for weddings, but I would imagine they're at least as strict as those of the mainstream LDS church (read the LDS clothing requirements here). Janelle wouldn't have worn that dark dress during her sealing ceremony. She wore it to the small family reception after. 

Janelle would have worn white temple robes for the sealing itself. Kody would have been dressed all in white for all of his sealings, too. The bride and groom also wear green aprons, which I think it supposed to represent the fig leafs Adam and Eve covered themselves with after realizing they had sinned.

I've cued up this video of a mainstream LDS sealing in the Temple to when the bride and groom approach the altar, so you can see what they wear.

 

Meri and Christine's wedding gowns were modest enough that they might have worn their dresses for the sealing itself, as well as the reception after, provided the AUB doesn't make the brides wear Temple robes, and also allows sufficiently modest gowns.

Although Robyn's gown had long sleeves, it did not cover her collar bones, so she couldn't have worn it to her ceremony (at least not without some insert that would cover the offending flesh). 

I honestly think Robyn just got a gown because TLC paid for stuff, since they featured the wedding reception on the show.

The Live Chat is still on the first page. It's just quite a bit of the ways down, because it hasn't been open in a couple of weeks (the schedule hasn't been all that clear). For at least one of the One-on-One episodes (formerly Tell Alls), we had our live chat at the beginning of the episode thread. Here's a direct link to the live chat thread. I hope that helps.

Thank you very much, General, especially for the video of an actual temple wedding.  I think it was a lovely service.  And Kotex did wear his white suit for a couple of his weddings, but not the hat--it looks like a turban?

And I think you're right; the TLC money and promotion made Crybrows' wedding what it was, but it still was wrong for Kotex to have anything to do with choosing the dress.  Somebody said of her famous father (Theodore Roosevelt?) that he was the bride at every wedding and the corpse at every funeral.  I think that's true of Kotex as well.

[S18.E19: Sister Wives: Talk Back Part 1 (Special Episode)]

I want to talk about Crybrows' wedding dress.  First of all, Kotex picked it out?  They don't know that this is the girly stuff that helps create bonds among sister-wives?

Second, as I recall, did any of the other wives have a wedding-dress shopping spree like Crybrows did?  I can't remember what Janelle wore; I think Merry had a read wedding dress, and Christine wore some home-made ugly thing.

Third, this was Crybrows' second wedding.  This would've been the time to wear a gorgeous cocktail dress or even an evening gown, but really, for a second wedding?

I hate these people with the heat of a burning sun, even old Christine, but I sure do like watching them.

Since I've been gone, Live Chat has disappeared from my screen.  That's the best reading--can anybody point me to it? Tnx.

[S18.E17: One on One: Part 3]

9 hours ago, vibeology said:

She was absolutely trying to pick a fight. Janelle and Christine were splitting the rental and some of their kids were going to have a second Christmas once Christine came to town. Because of Robyn, they were not invited to Meri's for Christmas Eve and were not welcome at Robyn's house unless they were willing to "have a conversation."

Everything from here on out is my best guess based on the comments we've gotten: I think the original plan was to mail or deliver gifts to anyone not attending Rental House Christmas (because of covid rules, work, being with in-laws etc) and those kids would open their gifts whenever and the Rental House kids would do their gifts on their second Christmas.

Robyn didn't like that there was going to be Rental House second Christmas and that she couldn't use the holiday as a way of forcing the apology that she claims she doesn't want. If there was no Christmas except for the one she hosted, those kids would have to come groveling to her or be left out. So instead of letting the kids do their best to connect at Christmas, she stuck her nose into the whole situation. She knew that a zoom call with 20+ people would be near impossible to organize but she wanted to cause a fight and ruin the kids gift exchange to punish the kids who refused to apologize to her. If Gwen's comment really was the one that kicked off the fight, she was looking to be offended because it wasn't that bad.

She thought she could use Gabe and Garrison's (and probably some of the other kids) desire to get together with their family and enjoy the holiday as a way to force their hands and when Janelle and Christine rented a house to circumvent her, she lashed out.

It really is hard to imagine how a 20+ person Zoom call would work, especially since some of the adults probably wouldn't feel Safe, the little kids wouldn't know what they were supposed to say, and the older kids apparently are holding grudges (justified or not).  Did Crybrows think that this made her look like a peacemaker or something?  "I tried so hard to get us all together for Christmas, and they all just hate me so much...<dissolve into dry tears>"

At this point, Christine has made it clear that she doesn't give a shit and just wants Crybrows to butt out of her life; Crybrows continuing to try to insert herself where she doesn't belong I guess *she* thinks makes her look good.

[S18.E17: One on One: Part 3]

1 hour ago, Twiz44 said:

I love reading all of your posts! I’ve watched this train wreck since Season 1, Episode 1. Everything else aside, I felt compelled to reply when the topic of the word “safe” was mentioned. This drives me crazy!  It seems to be a fairly new buzzword that is so overused and IMHO has been often misused for a while now. Add to that the word “gaslighting”. I doubt that any of these lunkheads have any idea that the word “gaslight” is an eponym, and its source. 
 

And just one more thing (channeling my Columbo)…do you think Christine sang “Let Me Call You Sweetheart” at her own wedding? Nah…

As I recall, there was a significant amount of time when Merry's go-to was "I don't feel safe" talking to Janelle.  Then something I can't remember happened, and Merry was pre-empted as the keeper of the safe.

Of Christine singing *anything* at her wedding:  have you heard Christine sing?  Even after lessons?  Angels in heaven stick their fingers in their celestial ears.

[S18.E17: One on One: Part 3]

16 hours ago, jschoolgirl said:

Who is this and where does the moniker come from?

Is it one of Robyn’s older daughters?

She-Ra is the female counterpart to He-Man of the 1980's cartoon series.  Does this make Kotex He-Man?  Then is Christine Skeletor, and Merry Man-O-Arms?  I'm confused. 

13 hours ago, OlderThanDirt said:

Speaking of Hunter, there never was much discussion on the show about his appointment to the Air Force Academy, was there?  I remember the episodes about his wrestling but then he dropped off the show; his choice I'm sure. I admire all the children who have declined to chase after attention. 

I wonder if there was any problem getting an endorsement from a representative (or whatever official has to nominate a kid for the service academies) to send a kid from an (illegal?) polygamous family to the AFA?  Does anybody know who his sponsor was?

[S18.E17: One on One: Part 3]

On 12/11/2023 at 2:36 PM, UsernameFatigue said:

Did we ever figure out why the Browns were taking the test? I do think Robyn took it, but Christine (and the others) certainly could have figured out Robyn's type, and each others. 

I gathered that it was just a fun thing they did, but Jebus it seems like Crybrows took it as a personal assault.  I mean, my husband gave me these tests over the years, and I'm Mussolini, and you just have to embrace it.

[S18.E17: One on One: Part 3]

8 hours ago, islandgal140 said:

That personality test wasn't something Christine found in Cosmo magazine that she made all the wives take for shits and giggles. I think they took it when they first went to that waste of a degree therapist Nancy. Christine couldn't possibly have taken it for her.

This was the big question for me.  A genuine therapist wouldn't use a test to determine "personality type"--this is, for me, *exactly* the kind of test you'd take for shits and giggles.  The closest to anything like this being used in a serious situation is maybe for hiring purposes.  My husband used to come home from management seminars with tests like this, to be used to figure out how to get the best from employees.

And then it sounded like Crybrows was implying that the test was Christine's evaluation of her personality, or that Christine took the test *for* her--which is not the feeling I got from the other wives.

I assumed it was one of those online personality "tests" that tell you what breed of dog you're most like, or what your favorite color tells about you.  It never occurred to me that it might have been a serious evaluation by their "therapist."  In that case--whoa.

[S11.E13: My Big Fat Family Heartbreak]

On 12/5/2023 at 11:48 PM, princelina said:

Interesting!  I get that her family cares, but a whole trainload of strangers letting Whitney get first helicopter because she claims she's feeling poorly?  Perhaps they were all paid to hang around until the Thores got first copters, and then all hustled back to the train 

Oh, if I were on that mountain, and there was a chance to get loud-mouth asshat Whitney out of there, I'd jump at it.  Yes!  Yes!  for the lurve of glob, get her away from me!  Leave me here to camp out in the train--just get her out of my life.

And to the question as to whether Whitney realizes how unappealing she is (and has been throughout the series), I think she's not quite seeing herself as others see her.  I truly don't think she knows how awful she comes across ("awfully?"), and totally agree that she needs therapy, serious therapy, because what will happen to her when the show inevitably ends, and all the people who are "interested" in her now want nothing to do with her?  So many of them--not just the barnacles--stick around because of the perks of being on the show, not to mention the paycheck.  If people are no longer constrained by the benefits of being her "friends," how will they treat her?

 

[S18.E16: One on One: Part 2]

9 hours ago, ladyscorpio said:

On the Tell Nothing last night, Sobbyn said Kody melted his ring way before she came in the picture and that's a lie. Meri said he stopped wearing it while he was dating Sobbyn. I'm sure it was all Sobbyn that put the idea in his head in the first place. She probably whined that she won't ever feel like his wife because he has a wedding ring already from his marriage with Meri. I bet she  guilt tripped him so much about the ring, that he ended up taking it off to show Sobbyn that Meri is no more important to him than she is. So that's why he told Meri he didn't want her to have "claim" over him. It bothered Sobbyn that Meri was his legal wife and she was so jealous of that. Sobbyn wanted to be the legal wife and hbic.  It's ridiculous how much she manipulates Kody and he is so blind to it all. She convinced him that she's the innocent one, and that everyone el is being mean to her and bullying her kids. Sobbyn is doing everything she can to make it look like she's not the cause of the family breaking up, that's why she keeps lying about the way things happened. She's trying to change the viewers perception of her and it's not working. She can't manipulate the viewers like she manipulated Kody.

I'm really tempted to blame Crybrows, too, but I think ditching his wedding ring was Kotex making himself more comfortable dating his soulmate and the love of his life.  I think Crybrows at that point was still dreaming of Ideal Polygamy. 

[S11.E13: My Big Fat Family Heartbreak]

20 hours ago, bichonblitz said:

I wonder if Whitney and Hunter now regret the "urgency" to get to know this new family. They should have taken it alot slower. The constant visits, vacations in Europe, etc are a bit much when they only first met a few months ago. I will say it's all because TLC wanted to make a season out of it and the new family is reaping the benefits from all the free TV comps so now Whitney has  to deal with the fall out of her father wanting to move to spend more time with Angie.  Too much too soon. 

I think the rush to cozy up to the new relatives was a bit much, too, but I think it bespeaks TLC's desperation in trying to salvage something from this shitshow.  How many more times will even the most hate-watchingest fan continue to tune in to see (choose one from column A, two from column B plus beverage) Whitney embark on a new career for about two seconds before she quits; Whitney fall in lurve with (your choice:  Lennie,  Boo-Bear--forbidden love!!!,  the Germanman, the Swissman, the insert your fave impossibly far away and unbelievable man; Whitney forces Glenn into some kind of awkwarder relationship where she is doyenne of his castle.  The choices are endless, and endlessly repetitive, and endlessly predictable.

I think TLC latched onto Angie also because Whitney can barely conceal her misplaced sense of superiority--hell, she can't conceal it at all!  And what drama *that* could produce!  I think Whitney believes Angie's family is trashy and not sophisticated enough to hang with the snooty Thores.  I bet offscreen, in private, Whitney makes merciless fun of them as hicks and red-necks, not people she would otherwise have in her life.  And TLC has to be aware of this.  Surely it's worth one more season of seeing Whitney make an absolute ass of herself.

And it's all the juicier because Glenn and Hunter seem to be genuinely fond of their new relatives and really want to get to know them.  So Whitney as we've seen focused on Glenn's affection for his new granddaughter (who I guess W. saw as her main competition for Daddy's affection) and so worked hard to show that she, Whitney, was *better* at everything.  But now--yikes!--Daddy has chosen *Angie* to go to the Bobst plant, and Daddy wants to move to Ala to help *Angie* find her adopted son (that Angie was a teen mom has got to rate really high on Whitney's trashometer)--dear glob!  Has Whitney misplaced all her energy in trying to defeat granddaughter (and it's typical that Whitney would match--equate?--herself with the cute, young, engaged woman rather than with her real competition, her own half-sister) when the viper in her breast was Angie all along?

Why wouldn't fans be hooked?  The biggest expense for TLC is hauling all this bunch on fancy vacations a few times a year--and I'm sure part of that is paid for in product placement advertising.  So *everybody* wins!

[S11.E12: My Big Swiss Family Thore]

On 12/2/2023 at 9:19 PM, Elizzikra said:

Even if the birth father is not named on the birth certificate, there are ways of terminating his parental rights. This must be done before a child can be placed for adoption. Named on the birth certificate or not, Glenn and Angie have no legal relationship. 

But that would be relevant only if one or both of them denied the paternity, right?  I get what you're saying, that if Angie were to sue for her "fair share" of the Thore millions, she wouldn't really have any basis in court--I hope I've got that right.  Thanks for clarifying this for me.

[S11.E12: My Big Swiss Family Thore]

4 hours ago, Elizzikra said:

Legally she isn’t related to Glenn at all. For her to be adopted, his parental rights had to have been terminated. Legally they are unrelated.

Legally, only if we know that Glenn was not named as father on Angie's birth certificate.

[S11.E12: My Big Swiss Family Thore]

On 11/30/2023 at 12:15 AM, Gramto6 said:

This show is taking a weird turn into soap opera land!  

@Yeah No I've been trying to give Angie and family the benefit of the doubt, but what you are saying is beginning to start to feel possible.

I think that Angie and Glen and Whitney have been in contact longer than they are trying to imply on the show. I remember when the previews started talking about the new sister,  one article said something to the effect that Whitney was not going to allow them on the show unless they agreed not to go after any inheritance. She must have had a reason for that stipulation beyond just being her selfish self. Maybe she sensed something about them... not sure about Glen.

It could be for Glen, a pleasant distraction from putting up with Whitney and facing his grief, which he is going to have to do eventually.  But even so, the way he presented the move/visit whatever it is to Alabamer, to Whitney was hurtful and mean. 

All this speculation about Whitney's not being willing to share her inheritance (and remember, Angie is just as related to Glenn as Whitney is) makes me wonder what kind of money we're talking about.  Glenn and Babs were comfortable, it's plain from their house and Glenn's purported sports car, but all that could have been provided by a normal upper-management salary and retirement benefits.  Not that that's not worth worrying about, especially if like Whitney you're never worked an honest day in your life.  I don't know what she makes from TLC, and I wonder how much of her compensation comes in the form of lavish vacations for large groups of people.

Is there family money we don't know about?  We never met afaik any of Babs' family, did we, or get a hint that Babs was from a wealthy family, and the only thing I know about money on Glenn's side is that his father worked for the same printing company.  And how much money do printing companies earn these days anyway?  Has anybody found out anything about how successful Glenn's company is?  Do they print major magazines, or is this a yearbook business?  Anyone with a computer and a good printer can do all the small jobs printers used to do, like cards and invitations.  How much money are we looking at, and is it enough for Whitney to make herself look greedy and petty over?

[S11.E12: My Big Swiss Family Thore]

On 11/29/2023 at 10:23 PM, Yeah No said:

Doesn't she realize that it's not by virtue of DNA that they obligate themselves to her, but by virtue of getting free trips to Switzerland and appearing on national TV?  Once the show is over they probably won't have the time of day for her.

And my glob, would anybody in the world voluntarily spend time with Whitney without compensation, and lots of it?  I know you'd have to pay me an awful lot to include her in my family celebrations.  If those Ala relatives hang on for any other reason, they're dumber than Whitney thinks they are.

[Spoiler, Speculation and Social Media]

6 hours ago, Gramto6 said:

You are spot on about Crybrows not accepting being a single parent. She should have seen how he acted before she had King Sol just looking at the other wives' situations.  Even so she expected Kootie to be there every second she felt she needed him and everyone else be darned! 

And you're right that Crybrows not wanting to be a single parent, and that started me thinking about how she always goes on and on about having sister wives to rock on the porch with, and yet how she didn't get it that Kotex was giving her special treatment and the other wives were resentful.

It occurred to me that Crybrows, when she's all gung-ho polygamy, imagines that all the sister-wives are as "hot" as she is and that Kotex is a sex slave to all of them, not just her.  And because she came into this with this (hypothetical) idea of polygamy, it never occurred to her that Kotex *wasn't* treating the other wives the way he treated her, whenin fact the other wives were suffering because of what he was doing for her.

I don't think this show is as scripted or as producer-driven as other shows I watch.   I despise Kotex and to a lesser extent Crybrows, but I think what they reveal of themselves is genuine.  Which is not to say flattering.

 

[S11.E13: My Big Fat Family Heartbreak]

17 hours ago, Yeah No said:

And I don't care if Whitney had it coming because of how she's been trying to control him.  It's still not right, IMHO.  He shouldn't be trying to get her back for what she's doing to him.  He's her father, he should be taking the high road.  At the very least he shouldn't have let the show have him present it so that it would feel like a punch to the gut.

I had never thought that Glenn would do such a thing (the condo in AL) to get back at Whitney--his demeanor and his facial expression say to me that this is fake drama, being created by tptb to maintain viewership.  I said that Glenn was reaping what he sowed because I think Whitney's awful behavior and personality have a lot to do with how she was raised, so he has some responsibility for the situation he finds himself in.

I'm really glad you mentioned the idea that this could be passive-agressive on Glenn's side, and I  honestly don't believe Glenn has it in him to do such a thing.   So now I've convinced myself that the whole moving to bama drama is scripted like a really bad soap opera, and of course that means I don't really know for sure just how awful Whitney really is.  And to congratulate her for another competition won--she's a better actor than Hunter.

And even now, as the scales fall from my eyes and I see the little man behind the curtain, I am still MBFFL's lapdog.  I'll be here next season--mission accomplished you TLC bastards.  Or whatever the hell channel this is on.

[S11.E13: My Big Fat Family Heartbreak]

I'm 76 years old, and if my spouse were to die, especially in the manner Babs did, with stroke after stroke and prolonged hospitalizations and stints in rehab, and my adult daughter who lived in the same town and had no real job decided to manage *my* life, particularly if she would not leave me alone *in my own house* that I had shared for decades with my beloved husband so that I could cry and hug his bathrobe and smell his aftershave, well, I would have jumped at the chance to escape to another place, an apartment/condo I could live in the way I wanted to live, at least for a while.

My health is shaky, but if I were to be suddenly widowed, my adult son who lives an hour or so from me had better not tell me I had to leave this big old house, this big old dilapidated house where we were so happy for so many years.  I would find someone to help me, a paid someone if I could afford it for as long as I could afford it.

He better not try to manage my grief, denying me the time and space to mourn in my own way.  Close as he is to his dad, he has no idea of how different filial attachment and spousal attachment are, and his loss is his to grieve, but it is not the same as my loss (and Glenn's) would be.

I don't care how hurt Whitney is by this belated courage on Glenn's part to try to get away from her, at least for a while.  She doesn't care how much she has hurt him by acting out what she thinks he should be doing and behaving like a toddler in constant tantrum when he frowns at her.  Sure, he is reaping what he has sown, but she's a middle-aged woman who can't forever blame her misbehavior on always having been "the favorite child."

I'm Team Glenn all the way, even though there is probably a good bit of opportunism behind all the love he's getting from Angie et al., especially their creepy insistence on including Babs at the wedding.

 

[S11.E13: My Big Fat Family Heartbreak]

11 hours ago, Yeah No said:

Re: Glenn and the condominium: I got the impression he was going to buy too.  At first I thought that perhaps giving the impression that he was going down there on a more permanent basis was producer driven, but the way Glenn presented it really seemed to hit Whitney like a ton of bricks and for once I thought her shocked reaction looked genuine.  By that point she was obviously very tired and still getting over her cold (or whatever she had) that her reactions had that unedited look of realism to me.  That leads me to believe that she was not in on any of this beforehand at all and it was news to her.  And actually I think even if Glenn intends to go down there on shorter trips giving that impression is a cruel thing to do to your own daughter, especially when it's being filmed and when you pretty much know it's going to be received negatively.  I've said it before but my father would NEVER have done that to me.  I don't care what an insufferable twit she is, his behavior is not justified even on that basis, IMHO.

Glob help me, I watched it again, and I *think* Glenn said he would "get" a condo "for a while"--which makes me think his idea (or more likely as you suggest the producers') is to stay in Ala to help Angie find her son.  It does sound open-ended, though.

I don't understand what makes Glenn especially useful in tracking down this son*--did he actually find Angie, or was she known about from the time she was adopted?  I'm unclear about this, and I'm also confused about what Angie means when she says she doesn't want to hurt her son but if she gets hurt it's OK.  If I were an adopted child with loving and beloved adoptive parents, I'm not sure I would want my biological parents hunting me down.  And there's a big difference between Glenn, who was I guess in the Marines when Angie's mother became pregnant, arranging to have the baby adopted--I mean, it wasn't out of the question back then for him to have married Angie's mom--and teenage Angie becoming pregnant and being unable to care for a child.  Glenn could have given Angie a perfectly happy life if he'd married her mother (and I don't buy "but maybe the parents would have hated each other" because why were they fucking in that case?), but Angie found herself a teenager in a jam.

*What makes Glenn useful in tracking down Angie's son is, of course, the TLC money that can be used to get things done.  I think you're right in that TPTB are feeling out a new storyline.  Maybe even they are tired of seeing what a horrible person Whitney is.