Kate Gosselin has spoken out about the controversial photo in which she dons a plastic geisha-style wig and pulls her eyes up at the corners to imitate the look of an Asian person.
"This was a happy memory of mine," Gosselin wrote on her website. A fan had sent the plastic wig, Gosselin said, and she and husband Jon took turns wearing it and snapping photos. Gosselin added a photo of Jon in the wig to her site. "Naturally, I 'slanted' my eyes to show him my best Asian impression, which made him smile," she wrote.
Jon Gosselin was born in Wisconsin, and his parents are a mix of European and Korean descent.
"At that time, a common topic of our show was 'everybody’s Asian' — except for mommy, so a thoughtful fan figured she’d help me look Asian too," Gosselin wrote.
"I married an Asian," she said in the post. "I have eight biracial children therefore I’m quite certain that I’m the last person that could be called a racist."
The photo of Gosselin making the gesture was distributed Sunday by someone calling him or herself "KatieDeen." That person created a fresh account on Twitter on Sunday evening, and posted just one item -- this picture, with the accompanying caption information suggesting that Gosselin "makes fun of Asians with 8 half Korean children."
Gosselin did not say if she knew who had published the photo, but did write that it "was taken and misused without my permission and opportunistically turned into something that it never was intended to be."
The gesture has caused controversy for others in the past, including in 2008 when the Spanish Olympic Team were photographed en masse for an advertisement making the gesture.