(October 26, 2017 at 10:02 am)KevinM1 Wrote: Yeah, a lot of the family oriented sitcoms of the late 70s, 80s, and early 90s tackled social issues. Family Ties was notorious for it. All In The Family. The Jeffersons. Roseanne. Diff'rent Strokes (which The Facts of Life is a spinoff of). Shit, M*A*S*H. Growing Pains. Webster (which is about interracial adoption, if you haven't seen it), when it wasn't just focused on Emmanuel Lewis being goofy. I'm sure there's a lot of others.
It's pretty amazing to compare it to the drek that counts as sitcoms today. From a writing standpoint, the most popular sitcoms, like Big Bang Theory, Two and a Half Men, etc. can't hold a candle to the older shows. At least they tried to have a purpose beyond lazy (and often misogynistic) hijinks. Even the fluffier shows of the day, like Cheers or Three's Company, exhibited far more wit and charm.
Actually Big Bang while more Sienfieldish by comparison, does convey tolerance. Sheldon is a handful, and you have a Jew and a Hindu as best friends. And the hot chick marries the geek.
But yea, I'd say MASH, out of all of them really shaped my liberal attitude. I really hated the way Frank treated the locals and I loved Hawkeye, BJ and Trapper's compassion in the face of those horrors.
Colonel Flag was a fucking loon. He made Frank seem sane. My favorite episode of MASH was when BJ got the shrink to shout "AIR RAID" outside the Swamp and Frank ran out and jumped in the fox hole BJ had just filled with water.
But I love Facts Of Life too. Jo was just one of those characters I wished I could have been myself back when I was growing up. Family Ties was great too. Everyone in that family besides Alex was a liberal.
