Do you think there could be a second Great Depression?

[PrettySquareGal]

I can't find them. Maybe Lizzie can...

I recall it being an interesting discussion.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I always found Archie the sort of character who was everywhere when I was growing up -- someone whose bark was decidedly worse than his bite. His prejudices grew largely out of his own fears and frustrations, not any inner hatefulness, and tended to evaporate quickly when confronted. The episode late in the series where Archie and Mike are trapped in the basement and Archie opens up about his childhood is extremely illuminating -- whoever wrote that script was clearly writing from life.

Ralph Kramden was the same sort of character. All his bluster grew out of frustration, not viciousness, and for all his so-called "political incorrectness" today I think he's a very realistic portrait of the sort of urban working-class American who came of age during the Depression. He's about ten years older than Archie Bunker, but they were brothers under the skin.

As far as material depictions go, the Bunker house in AITF was a dead ringer for my grandparents' home. Those were the kind of surroundings I grew up in, and I remember being impressed at seeing people on TV, at long last, who lived the way we did.

 

[Angus Forbes]

I agree about the material aspect in the case of AITF, but disagree about Archie (or Ralph) being a realistic portrait of working-class men of the era. Contrast this with the portrayal in the second season of "The Wire." Nor was Edith anything like anybody I ever met. But Meathead, well . . . Moreover, AITF seemed to strive to be vulgar, at least to me.

I am incorrigible on this subject, so I would rather not say too much more except that, to me, AITF was a landmark in the destruction of American culture. All of this is highly subjective, I suppose. Sorry -- I didn't mean to try to derail the thread . . .

 

[PrettySquareGal]

I agree about the material aspect in the case of AITF, but disagree about Archie (or Ralph) being a realistic portrait of working-class men of the era. Contrast this with the portrayal in the second season of "The Wire." Nor was Edith anything like anybody I ever met. But Meathead, well . . . Moreover, AITF seemed to strive to be vulgar, at least to me.

I am incorrigible on this subject, so I would rather not say too much more except that, to me, AITF was a landmark in the destruction of American culture. All of this is highly subjective, I suppose. Sorry -- I didn't mean to try to derail the thread . . .

I grew up in lower-working-class NYC and found AITF to be the closest thing on TV to what's "real" over anything else I had seen at the time. I still love it today. Not a single thing in it was gratuitous.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

I agree about the material aspect in the case of AITF, but disagree about Archie (or Ralph) being a realistic portrait of working-class men of the era. Contrast this with the portrayal in the second season of "The Wire." Nor was Edith anything like anybody I ever met. But Meathead, well . . . Moreover, AITF seemed to strive to be vulgar, at least to me.

I am incorrigible on this subject, so I would rather not say too much more except that, to me, AITF was a landmark in the destruction of American culture. All of this is highly subjective, I suppose. Sorry -- I didn't mean to try to derail the thread . . .

How did it destroy American culture? If anything it facilitated discussions after each episode and was very enlightening without being in-your-face preachy.

 

[Angus Forbes]

I am curious -- if you don't mind saying, what era did you grow up in? If you do mind, I apologize for the question.

 

[LizzieMaine]

I agree about the material aspect in the case of AITF, but disagree about Archie (or Ralph) being a realistic portrait of working-class men of the era. Contrast this with the portrayal in the second season of "The Wire." Nor was Edith anything like anybody I ever met. But Meathead, well . . . Moreover, AITF seemed to strive to be vulgar, at least to me.

My own mother is, to this day, a bizarre amalgamation of Archie and Edith, with a mouth that'd scare away a longshoreman. If you tried to tell her she was vulgar she'd say "g-d right, and what's it to ya?"

My grandfather had strong Archie-like traits -- we didn't have any black people around to be prejudiced against, so his prejudices were directed toward tourists and "friggin' summer people", but they were very superficial prejudices. If a "friggin' summer person" needed help, he was always the first to offer it, and his gruffness concealed a very kind, decent person. Archie was, the way I saw him, the same kind of man.

 

[Angus Forbes]

AITF was a turning point in the following sense: Norman Lear was deliberately testing the limits of what could be shown on TV. He is proud of this. But rather than bump up against the limits, and be pushed back a little, he demonstrated conclusively that there were in fact virtually no limits. Since then, downhill all the way regarding what is shown on TV. Lowest common denominator. Anything that sells. If it bleeds, it leads. Pre AITF, things were quite different on TV, and therefore in our culture. Just my opinion, of course.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

I am curious -- if you don't mind saying, what era did you grow up in? If you do mind, I apologize for the question.

I grew up in the 1970s and 80s.

 

[LizzieMaine]

See, I've always seen it more as a throwback to the sort of adult oriented dramas that were common in the earliest years of television -- that's the key, I always watched AITF as though it were a one-act play, not a sitcom. If Arthur Miller had written for television in the early seventies, his work would have been very similar to what Lear's crew turned out on AITF.

I didn't care for all the Lear shows -- I thought "Maude" was strident and shallow -- but the scripts on AITF stand, to me, with the best of anything that came out of the Chayefsky-Serling era of live television.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

AITF was a turning point in the following sense: Norman Lear was deliberately testing the limits of what could be shown on TV. He is proud of this. But rather than bump up against the limits, and be pushed back a little, he demonstrated conclusively that there were in fact virtually no limits. Since then, downhill all the way regarding what is shown on TV. Lowest common denominator. Anything that sells. If it bleeds, it leads. Pre AITF, things were quite different on TV, and therefore in our culture. Just my opinion, of course.

Limits vs Standards.

TV today has no limits or standards. AITF was full of standards, morals and lessons about life.

 

[Angus Forbes]

I grew up in the 1970s and early to mid 80s.

Thanks for the answer. Perhaps our reactions are different because of our age difference -- I grew up in the late 1940's-1950's. I'm not saying that I know any more than you do; rather, I am only saying that we may have different ways of looking at things. When you saw AITF, it was old hat, culturally. To me, it was repellant and shocking, as Lear intended it to be.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

Thanks for the answer. Perhaps our reactions are different because of our age difference -- I grew up in the late 1940's-1950's. I'm not saying that I know any more than you do; rather, I am only saying that we may have different ways of looking at things. When you saw AITF, it was old hat, culturally. To me, it was repellant and shocking, as Lear intended it to be.

But it was shocking to many with a point. Not shocking for shock value.

 

[Angus Forbes]

Maude . . oh, my. I actually knew a guy who wrote for Maude. A truly vacuous program.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

Thanks for the answer. Perhaps our reactions are different because of our age difference -- I grew up in the late 1940's-1950's. I'm not saying that I know any more than you do; rather, I am only saying that we may have different ways of looking at things.

Yes, it could be.

 

[Angus Forbes]

But it was shocking to many with a point. Not shocking for shock value.

I admit that we relics of the 1940's were a bad bunch, who really needed to be shocked by people from Hollywood like Lear so that we would straighten up and fly right. A culture can get only so far with "Father knows best."

 

[PrettySquareGal]

I admit that we relics of the 1940's were a bad bunch, who really needed to be shocked by people from Hollywood like Lear so that we would straighten up and fly right. A culture can get only so far with "Father knows best."

It's the first show of its kind to introduce racism, sexism, welfare, environmental issues, the political activism of the younger generations, guns, ageism, and on the list goes. And of course, back to the topic of this thread, getting by in a recession.

I just love the show is all.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Maybe the difference is that some of us *didn't* find AITF shocking. I never identified with FNB, or Beaver, or any of those shows, even though I watched them as a kid -- the only thing my father knew best was how to avoid a steady job and loaf around the poolroom all day. So those shows had no more relevance to my own life than a documentary on Papuan tribesmen. A show where people fought and yelled, on the other hand, was exactly the world I knew.

 

[vitanola]

I remember watching the show when visiting my aunt and uncle, who lived at 23-27 32nd street in Astoria. It could have been written about my Uncle Joe and Aunt Bertha.

 

[Feraud]

A show where people fought and yelled, on the other hand, was exactly the world I knew.

Ha, that sounds like my family get togethers.
I can remember my wife being intimidated when she first met my family. What she thought was screaming and fighting was (for better or worse) how the family communicated.

My paternal grandparents were very Bunker like. One difference being my grandmother was no Edith. She was as loud and crass as grandpa! My dad inherited a good part of that persona. Some might say I did too..[huh]