The other day I had the pleasure of driving on the country roads outside of Charlottesville, Virginia in the area of Walton's Mountain. The setting for The Waltons television show, that was a ratings hit on CBS from 1972 to 1981.
For those that don't recall, it was the show's creator,Earl Hammer Jr.'s recollection of growing up in the Blue Ridge Mountains during the Depression and World War II. A poor, but proud and loving family. Featuring two generations of Patriarchs and Matriarchs strong physically and in their faith in God and their own family of seven children's destiny.
It is generally accepted that the Baby Boomer generation was given a false impression of American family life by the sitcoms of the Fifties and Sixties.
There is really no need here to describe the lifestyles of Ward and June Cleaver, The Donna Reed Show's Donna and Dr. Alex Stone and most definitely Jim and Margaret Anderson's roles in the certainly politically incorrect Father Knows Best. All the moms were in beautiful dresses and as casual as a dad got was a cardigan sweater with his necktie.
They never ate in the kitchen, did alcohol or other drugs, what else have any financial concerns though they were all one income households. In fact, in most cases it was unclear what the father's actual employment was . Television network standards would not even permit them to be in the same bed together.
Growing up I assumed there were regions in this Country that people actually lived that way and certainly when I grew up that is what my life would model.
The 1980s brought a new world order of sitcoms with Everybody Loves Raymond its copycat King of Queens that earned it's laughs with the Dagwood and Blondie formula of dumb males that were incapable of heading a household, handling their boss, or changing a light bulb. Their wives were by contrast not only much more physically attractive than their husbands but far superior in all practical and intellectual ways to their comic foil nincampoop husbands.
Then in the 90's the generation of our kids sitcoms they got The Simpsons, Family Guy, and King of the Hill, where with the use of animation the male role was effectively reduced to an even lower intellect basically unable to survive a mental hygiene hearing to be saved only by a barely intellectually superior wife, but the man is consistent butt of all the laughs.
It is just television, it is just entertainment. If so, why do so many in my generation blame our fifty percent plus divorce rate on the false impression of the proper American family we derived from the aforementioned shows. Our rushing to marriage, the proper amount of children, a split level house and the pursuit of the Ozzie and Harriet American Dream?
Statistics show that fewer couples of my children's generation are marrying and those that do, are at a much older age. This should prove to be a good thing. My observation is that young men are now more liberated from the here to before roles assigned to males, that were unrealistic, but in many cases have been just as persuaded by the boob tube that they are boobs.
As sappy as one might want to label the family Walton, from my vantage of knowing the two generations prior to mine. I believe that the portrayal of that family was much more realistic for that era than any other previously mentioned shows were of theirs.
Men and women are equally strong and able. I believe it is just as politically incorrect to show the male as an idiot as it was for the Jackie Gleason character on the Honeymooners. Ralph Cramden to make a fist and threaten to send his wife Alice to the moon.
Those that know me, know I am far from humorless, but in my opinion it is wrong and cheap to get laughs by creating a false stereotype for either sex. Actually worse than the pristine perfection of the unreal lives in the 50's and 60's television shows.
Though maudlin and somewhat boring, the generation portrayed by the Walton's that were entertained by books and storytelling, rather than television's persuasion is now known as the Greatest Generation, coincidence?
