I must admit, “Keeping up with the Kardashians” is one of my favorite TV shows. As I flip the channel to E!, I become so excited to watch my favorite family. As my dad enters our family room to see what episode I am watching, but mainly to stare at Kim’s physique, he scowls at me.
“This is the stupidest show ever,” he says.
I then shake my head at my dad because he doesn’t realize that he, and every other family in the United States of America, embodies the Kardashians in his own way.
This is the breakdown of a typical American family: the conservative father, the outgoing mother, the golden intelligent child, the dumb good-looking child and the black sheep. Believe it or not, despite the cameras that follow their every move, the Kardashians exemplify this stereotype.
Bruce Jenner, the Kardashians’ step-dad and Olympic gold medalist, is the conservative, overprotective father. When the family had a discussion about whether Kim should do the cover of Playboy magazine, Bruce immediately vetoed the idea. When Kylie, the youngest of Kardashian-Jenner clan, had her best guy friend in her room, Bruce immediately stormed in, yelling that boys are not allowed in her room.
The mother of this crazy clan is Kris Jenner: the liberal, outgoing mother who believes she is still 25 and her daughters are her girlfriends. So your own mother may not go out clubbing with you in Vegas, but I’m sure she listens to your genre of music, attempting to be your best friend. Or perhaps you have caught your mother wearing your jeans and her reason for burglary is, “Don’t best friends share clothing?”
The oldest Kardashian kid is Kourtney, who is the designated golden child. Kourtney is the only Kardashian girl to go to college, and she helped open a clothing store with her mom. Every family has a Kourtney, the oldest sibling who sets the expectation-bar high and does everything well.
The next kid in the clan is Kim: the not-so-smart, beautiful bombshell of the family. Kim represents that one kid who is absolutely gorgeous. Every other member of the family is compared to this sibling at family gatherings.
The next Kardashian is Khloe: the hostile black sheep of the family. Khloe is five feet nine inches tall and does not look like her siblings. She feels like she is treated differently than her sisters. Every family has a Khloe: the one kid who doesn’t feel part of the family and is constantly compared to her siblings.
The youngest Kardashian kid, and only son, is Robert. Rob is a talented basketball player, following in his father’s athletic footsteps and attended the University of Southern California. Every family has a Rob: the sibling who gets their fair share of attention for being the youngest and the only son in the family.
You should be realizing that your own family has characteristics in common with the Kardashians. However, if you think that your middle-class family from Bethesda is perfectly normal, think again, because every family has some crazy. It is an inevitable truth that you can not deny.
Take my family, for example: from a glance we look normal. I have two parents, two brothers, a sister, a cat and a dog. Everyone in my family has gone to college, we watch baseball, go to the beach together, have family dinners — my family is an “all American family.”
But little do you know that I have a great-aunt who was in the original Broadway production of “Gypsy” and played a stripper, and reprised her role in the movie version. She has been rumored to date Marlon Brando and her latest claim to fame has been her multiple political runs for the mayor of D.C.
Maybe you don’t have an aunt who was a stripper on Broadway, but do you have a family member who has visited every ball park in America, or is in rehab, or has had too much botox, or includes their pets in their Christmas card? If you said yes to any of these options, your family is crazy, too.
So next time you claim your family with the white picket-fence, a tire swing on the tree in the front lawn, and family portrait in the foyer is normal, think again: maybe you are the ones that should have a reality TV show.
