An AD article about singer Maan de Steenwinkel and her now ex-lover Karel Gerlach causes astonishment. Media expert Mark Koster is brief about it: “What kind of strange story is this?”
The relationship between Maan de Steenwinkel and Karel Gerlach of Goldband is over, it was announced last week. It A.D uses the break for an extensive argument about sexism in the media, the role of Johan Derksen and the question of whether the outside world destroyed Maan. But media journalist Mark Koster thinks it is a vague story.
Went wrong
The article suggests that media criticism of Maan played a role in the demise of her relationship. “From the beginning, they were more concerned with defending their relationship than celebrating it. Because no matter how happy they were, according to the outside world, Maan was in the gutter because of Karel.”
Maan always made very cheerful pop songs, but during her relationship with Karel started making all kinds of complicated, grim music. Now she has no more hits. “Things went a bit wrong with Maan when she got into a relationship with that boy from Goldband,” Tina Nijkamp concluded, for example, in Today Inside.
Bad influence
The AD thinks this is very wrong. “It went so ‘wrong’ because Maan wanted to ‘do something a bit alternative’ since the relationship, says Nijkamp. Elsewhere too, Gerlach is portrayed as a bad influence who ruins the good Maan.”
Tim Hofman once summarized the picture as: “It is not Maan who makes other songs, it is the drug-addicted, paranoid slut who has gone completely down the drain because of her boyfriend.”
‘Facts please!’
There is a ‘broader problem’, according to the AD. “Things are not going wrong, according to Maan, things are going well. But in the media that is a side issue,” he said. “You often hear old men like Johan Derksen talk about Maan. By talking hatefully about female artists in popular programs, this threatens to become normal.”
What nonsense, says Mark Koster. He is short about it X. “What kind of strange story is this? Because the media is critical of Maan, her relationship has ended? Could it be, but what shows that? Especially because she emphatically said she was happy. She is not quoted anywhere. So facts please.”