Could it be that tv shows that depict ';model'; families set us up with false expectations?

Or do these shows give us a chance to see what living in functional families could be like?





Almost none of us have experienced the kinds of tv families I grew up with. I'm not even sure we should accept these models--e.g. The Waltons, Little House on the Prairie, The Cosby Show, The Brady Bunch, Seventh Heaven, etc.





What about alternatives? What about the families we create ourselves as adults with the power to choose who will be our nearest and dearest?





What do you think?Could it be that tv shows that depict ';model'; families set us up with false expectations?
Such an innocuously simple looking question which is actually, on second glance, bonecrunchingly complicated.





Most of us experience family directly before comprehending anything on TV. Being raised from infancy is the first experience of family, and the conflict (if there is one) between expectations and reality can come from so many sources.





Most kids find an ideal even if its just the family down the road who let their boy stay up a half hour later.





So what about false expectations? And really what is an expectation. In the Little House on the prairie, that everything is wholesome and apple pie with the odd disaster in a rural setting...so hard to say what is realistic there.





Perhaps unhappiness drives us to look for alternatives to our reality, and perhaps seeing these model families causes unhappiness by causing kids to aspire to what they don't have. Probably both are true.





The alternative I think come not from restricting experience but diversifying it. Flooding with experiences of many different real families, visiting old peoples homes, participating in community. If the village raises the child then the child is raised to understand the village.





If TV is the only window a child has to the outside world, then it has nothing to metric that against except the single experience of its own family life.





Exposure to diversity inoculates us against prejudice and refocuses expectations in that diverse reality. That is what we can do for our children and ourselves as adults.





Thats what I think (and I also feel quite smug with that answer)Could it be that tv shows that depict ';model'; families set us up with false expectations?
there is an important difference in different county's,but the most the TV makers are wanted to show are the best sellers and that is not the fact of live
Indie,





I was prepared to write the Great American Novel while I answered your question. Now, there is no way I can. Twilight answered it better than I or anyone else I know could. My vote is for Twilight.





Bill
Of course t.v. and other media fuels what we want in life, because it all looks so perfect. It goes to play with self-fulfilling prophecies as well- A person sees a perfect family, wishes they could have it, and feels even worse when they realize that they can't make theirs work like that.