Parenting

 by: Mark Rigney

With a very few notable exceptions, TV programming in the last decade... or three... has been relatively lame. Huh? You disagree? Let's not forget "Supertrain," or "Meet the Parents," "Am I Hot," "When Animals Attack," or any of the brilliant sludge created and perpetrated by Fox.

But - ask any child of the 60's about Gilligan's Island, I Dream of Jeannie, The Andy Griffith Show, or any of the dozens of other programs we were weaned on, and you'll see an instant smile and wink of recognition.

Why doesn't today's TV programming bring out the best in us the way the classics do?

My belief? TV reflects the times, and those were far more innocent times. Much of it was before the Kennedy assasinations, all of it was before Watergate, and as a people, we still believed in fairy tales.

I know that may sound cynical to some, but TV now has a harsh, friendly and often mean edge to it, while TV-Land still celebrates an age of innocence that I think most of us might still yearn to return to. After all, what HONEST parent will admit to allowing their kids to watch anything in prime time any more?