Flawed TV parents are the norm these days, but that wasn’t always the case

Vulture

In the early days of television, parents knew best, and they always had everything under control. But that control evolved with chaotic family shows like Roseanne and The Simpsons. As Jen Chaney notes, “most of the people creating or portraying parents on television at the moment are either Generation-Xers or older millennials, the same people who were raised on Brady Bunch reruns and The Cosby Show, but also embraced Roseanne and The Simpsons. These generations spent more time during childhood watching TV than any previous generations, and having their ideas about family shaped by that from an early age. They saw parents they wanted to emulate, but also eventually became acutely aware that much of what sitcoms had fed them was comfort food.”