Not exactly the best parents

[caladon]

Although Mike and Carol may have had good intentions in the way they parented their kids, there are some glaring examples that showed that their parenting skills were quite lacking. Some examples can be found in:

54-40 Or Fight - Instead of insisting on compromise and family unity they chose a competition; and a silly one at that.

Getting Davy Jones - Should have forced the issue of having Marcia own up to making a promise she had no right to make.

Mail Order Hero - Similar situation different kid. I guess they'll never learn.

Sorry Right Number - Establish rules about the phone; any violations result in punishment and/or loss of allowance that week. Parents showed no backbone in this episode.

Goodbye Alice, Hello - The kids acting immature (especially for their ages at the time) treat Alice like dirt, causing her to leave. When Mom finds out, she gets mad and delivers a brief but otherwise useless lecture (to only two of the offenders) and goes back to her needle point. Not only should she have made an immediate effort to find Alice so the kids could apologize, she should then mete out a fitting punishment, such as having the kids do Alice's work for two weeks.

What makes your list of bad-parenting examples from the show, and what would you have done?

[rcbrad]

One thing that always bugged me was in the episode Try, try again, where Jan knocks the unbaked souffle off of the counter onto the floor. Even though she apologies, she simply walks away without offering to help to clean up the mess. I guess she/they figured that is what Alice is for? She could have at least offered to help clean it up?

I do not think that I would consider these examples bad parenting, that may be a bit harsh. I am not sure what word(s) would describe it. There would not be as much of a story or a different story to tell if at least some of the examples above played out differently as you suggest. Good idea for a thread. Maybe others have additional examples/thoughts?

[cleverfun3000]

I guess the idea of taking a strap and whipping these children was out of the question?

[gidgetgrape]

I think Mike and Carol were cool, hands-on parents. They listened and tried to understand what their kids were going through. They also aimed for gender equality. The only episode that gave me the hives was "Jan's Aunt Jenny." I don't know what message the writers were trying to tell us that week, but I wouldn't have allowed Jan to carry on the way she did.

[PracTz]

I always disliked the one in which they caught Peter pitting all the other sibs against each other due to him snooping around and misusing the info- then they lectured him and he agreed not to do it anymore. That's all. Oh, but THEN when Greg and Marcia decide that that wasn't much of a punishment and try to prove Peter was still sneaking around [by planting that fake party on the tape recorder], Mike+Carol sabotage THEM by throwing the party for Peter and punish them for challenging their authority but don't do anything about Peter having blatantly been caught sneaking around again.

[James]

Originally Posted by PracTz

I always disliked the one in which they caught Peter pitting all the other sibs against each other due to him snooping around and misusing the info- then they lectured him and he agreed not to do it anymore. That's all. Oh, but THEN when Greg and Marcia decide that that wasn't much of a punishment and try to prove Peter was still sneaking around [by planting that fake party on the tape recorder], Mike+Carol sabotage THEM by throwing the party for Peter and punish them for challenging their authority but don't do anything about Peter having blatantly been caught sneaking around again.

I wonder why Mike and Carol bought Peter a tape recorder at the end of the episode!

[Rich3]

Originally Posted by PracTz

I always disliked the one in which they caught Peter pitting all the other sibs against each other due to him snooping around and misusing the info- then they lectured him and he agreed not to do it anymore. That's all. Oh, but THEN when Greg and Marcia decide that that wasn't much of a punishment and try to prove Peter was still sneaking around [by planting that fake party on the tape recorder], Mike+Carol sabotage THEM by throwing the party for Peter and punish them for challenging their authority but don't do anything about Peter having blatantly been caught sneaking around again.

But they were trying to set him up as a joke. They were playing upon his weakness.

That would be like giving a free drink to an alcoholic. It was wrong.

[Jack1000]

Originally Posted by PracTz

I always disliked the one in which they caught Peter pitting all the other sibs against each other due to him snooping around and misusing the info- then they lectured him and he agreed not to do it anymore. That's all. Oh, but THEN when Greg and Marcia decide that that wasn't much of a punishment and try to prove Peter was still sneaking around [by planting that fake party on the tape recorder], Mike+Carol sabotage THEM by throwing the party for Peter and punish them for challenging their authority but don't do anything about Peter having blatantly been caught sneaking around again.

Agree 100%!

That episode 'The Private Ear" sends the wrong message. Mike and Carol REWARDING Peter by giving him a tape recorder, which caused all the problems in the first place. So what if Peter got his feelings hurt? It seems that was the reason for the party.

The family giving the party for Peter in "The Hero" episode is a little more understandable. (The episode where he saves the little girl from the falling shelf in the Toy Store, than exaggerates his deed till his family and friends are sick of him talking about it.) When nobody comes to the party, the family decides to eat all the food anyway. They probably didn't want the $50 in pizza and soda to go to waste. Wow! That would be at least $100 today!

Jack

[sixfingers]

Originally Posted by caladon

...
Mail Order Hero - Similar situation different kid. I guess they'll never learn.
...

They did make Bobby own up to it in the end. Nobody believed him though.

[sixfingers]

Originally Posted by caladon

...

54-40 Or Fight - Instead of insisting on compromise and family unity they chose a competition; and a silly one at that.

...

This reminds me of a Full House episode where DJ and Stephanie couldn't agree on what to get as a reward for returning a run away commercial mascot parrot
(big screen TV or Karaoke machine) so they let Michelle decide, and she chose a cardboard standie.

I guess the Brady controversy worked out better, even though the TV had one of those clunky sonic remote controls.

[Tweety]

Originally Posted by caladon

Although Mike and Carol may have had good intentions in the way they parented their kids, there are some glaring examples that showed that their parenting skills were quite lacking. Some examples can be found in:

54-40 Or Fight - Instead of insisting on compromise and family unity they chose a competition; and a silly one at that.

Getting Davy Jones - Should have forced the issue of having Marcia own up to making a promise she had no right to make.

Mail Order Hero - Similar situation different kid. I guess they'll never learn.

Sorry Right Number - Establish rules about the phone; any violations result in punishment and/or loss of allowance that week. Parents showed no backbone in this episode.

Goodbye Alice, Hello - The kids acting immature (especially for their ages at the time) treat Alice like dirt, causing her to leave. When Mom finds out, she gets mad and delivers a brief but otherwise useless lecture (to only two of the offenders) and goes back to her needle point. Not only should she have made an immediate effort to find Alice so the kids could apologize, she should then mete out a fitting punishment, such as having the kids do Alice's work for two weeks.

What makes your list of bad-parenting examples from the show, and what would you have done?

Interesting points.

54-40: Competition can teach kids valuable lessons...about winning and losing and how to behave in both situations. They allowed the kids to set their own rules for the competition and then correctly forced the boys to live by those rules, since they all agreed to them ("anything counts", even though it might not have seemed "fair" that Tiger caused the house of cards to collapse). While building a house of cards might seem like a silly idea, the writers were probably trying to have them come up with an event that didn't require great physical strength (because the boys would have an advantage) but instead relied on skill and hand-eye coordination and steady nerves. Mike talked to the boys about being gracious in defeat and Carol "convinced" the girls to select a gift that would benefit the entire family (both Mike and Carol probably would have planned to do that regardless of who won).

Getting Davy Jones - they went a little far, but Marcia was relying on a letter she received from Davey Jones talking about how he's looking forward to meeting her fan club or some such thing. Marcia was probably a little too old to take that "promise" seriously, but I don't think Mike was out of line to at least take her down to the TV station when they found out Jones was in town. But once that failed, they did correctly tell Marcia to own up to it so that the school would have time to find another musical act for the dance. Not that she listened to them...

Mail Order Hero - that situation was a bit different because while Mike and Carol knew what was going on with Marcia and her promise to get Davy Jones, they had no idea about Cindy's letter to Joe Namath until he showed up at their door. Once they found out what happened, they were not pleased. And sixfingers is correct, once they found out, they did make Bobby tell his friends the truth. What was funny about that ep was when Carol says to Mike "We don't even know Joe Namath, do we Mike?" lol, she had to ask Mike if they knew Joe Namath!

Sorry Right Number - putting in a pay phone was a very silly "solution". They should have simply set limits on phone usage and stuck to it. They seldom let the kids walk all over them, but they kind of did in that episode.

Goodbye Alice Hello - I agree with your points 100%. IIRC, Mike wasn't in that episode, right? They made Carol be the tough parent. Her reaction was not exactly realistic when she found out what the kids did. And why Alice would leave without at least letting Carol know how to get in touch with her is beyond me.

[Tweety]

As to why Mike and Carol bought Peter the tape recorder at the end of "The Private Ear", couple of points:

1) Mike was probably tired of the kids borrowing his tape recorder and then not putting it back

2) Buying a gift like that for Peter was really like buying it for the whole family. There's no way a gift like that wasn't going to be shared among the kids. It wouldn't have been Peter's exclusively.

3) I guess maybe they did want to teach Greg and Marcia a lesson about not taking punishments into their own hands. G & M are a little older and probably understood where they went wrong without needing further punishment or lectures. Re: the party, that was a way of putting the whole thing behind them and moving on. Plus, Peter never did bug anyone's room again during the series, so I guess it worked...he learned his lesson!

[TVMakesMeHappy]

Marcia obviously didn't learn the lesson from what she & Greg did to Peter in the tape recorder episode because she & Jan did something so similar to Cindy in the Shirley Temple episode.

[Johnny be good!]

For God's sake, this is television. Take a freakin chill pill!

[TVMakesMeHappy]

We're on a website dedicated to television so we know it's just a TV show. These message boards are set-up to discuss these shows. It's just conversation.