September 21, 2026
How TV Dads Went From Leaders to Losers
This article is part 3 in a series of articles exploring the contributing factors behind the exploding mental health crisis in our younger generations. We are connecting the forces driving it and explaining why the primary “solution” of placing and funding school based mental health clinics in our schools will only exacerbate the problem. It’s because all the narratives contributing to the problem will be promoted through these clinics! Remember that.
Part 1 details the mental health data between generations and between young men and young women. It also describes the shift in education away from academics toward mental health and describes the frameworks and structural supports that have been implemented.
Part 2 takes readers on a brief history of the major “isms” of Post-modernism, Cultural Marxism, Sexism, Racism/Multiculturalism, Transgenderism and Adultism which all promote the common narrative that there is no such thing as universal truth. Reality is what you personally believe it to be. Each of these oppressor/oppressed conflicts were products of the Cultural Marxist strategies for revolution. Each undermines the identities and the emotional, spiritual and psychological securities of our youth, leaving them adrift, confused and extremely vulnerable to manipulation.
This article will briefly address the Cultural Marxists terribly destructive but incredibly effective strategy of destabilizing and attacking the family.
The family is the single most powerful institution for raising and protecting children and for stabilizing the foundation of any healthy society. A stable two-parent, heterosexual family is the most significant predictor of a child’s future success in life, whether it be education, employment, marriage, freedom from addictions, or staying out of prison. The data is indisputable, and the information has been known, though seldom acknowledged, for over 50 years.
The absence of fathers in the home has invited an explosion of dysfunctional government policy. As stated by Kendall Qualls:
Enabled by welfare and other “Great Society” handouts, the resulting low academic scores, high incarceration rates and rampant unemployment confirm the massive negative impact progressive policies have had on black America. They’re policies . . . we will not fix until fathers once again lead black homes. (Take Charge Minnesota, “Black families need fathers, not reparations for slavery.”)
Another example of deliberate government policies which weaken the family is the “Affordable Care Act” (Obama Care), which engages in massive discrimination against married people.
Additionally, all of the “isms” we wrote about in Part 2 have systematically targeted the traditional family by redefining it as “outdated”, “bigoted” and “oppressive”, yet ironically “privileged” at the same time, How’s that for cognitive dissonance? Therefore, as the narrative goes, the traditional “privileged” family must be dismantled because it’s “harmful” for children.
This attack on families is one reason Child Protection League has been focused on defending parental rights and the protection of children since our 2013 founding. We honor and elevate the family and know that “civilizations were built by men and women with families to feed.” We strongly support all efforts which strengthen traditional families and protect children from violence, exploitation and indoctrination.
Impact of media
Americans’ overconsumption of media is now undeniable. Every home has multiple televisions, everybody has a cell phone with internet access, and everybody is on some kind of screen. Excessive screen time is a growing concern in the cognitive development of children. We have been writing and speaking extensively about the Shallow Brain. You can watch a 35-minute presentation here. Screens physically change how a child’s brain develops. We provide very practical solutions and steps everybody can take.
Screens change children’s perception of reality. Media deeply and fundamentally influences their patterns of thought and their comprehension of their family and of themselves. Just consider that the average middle schooler now spends an average of 12 hours a day on some kind of screen! Outside of school, they are scrolling through social media or watching someone else for most of their waking hours.
Fathers are no longer portrayed as strong and wise leaders.
Old shows from the 1950s and 60s like Leave it to Beaver, The Waltons and Bonanza portrayed fathers as wise, emotionally controlled, respected and the final authorities on moral and ethical issues. They were strong, steady and brave. Home was a peaceful sanctuary and children who occasionally got into mischief were gently instructed to right their wrongs and apologize. While these depictions didn’t focus on the failures of family life, they did address the struggles and offered a model.
Then came the 70s and Archie Bunker, just as the culture war was taking control of the institutions. The blue-collar dad of All in the Family was blatantly racist and horribly unkind and disrespectful to his wife. He called her “Dingbat.” Their home was chaos and constantly filled with strife. Archie just wanted to drink beer and watch TV in peace after work. He didn’t want his family or family responsibilities to get in his way. He felt his only obligations were keeping a roof over their heads and food on the table.
By the 1980s and 90s, fathers like those in Everybody Loves Raymond, Family Guy, and Married…With Children, were just “idiot dads.” They were incompetent, inept, bumbling and often treated like children by their TV wives. They were incapable of leading, often indulging in mindless and childish pleasures, easily distracted and almost always wrong.
This portrayal has persisted. TV dads are primarily comic relief – derided and disdained.
How were mothers portrayed?
In shows that still included married mothers and fathers, mothers evolved from emotionally supportive, family-oriented, respectful, loving wives and homemakers to exasperated, sharp-witted, mocking, openly defiant managers of the whole family. Additionally, they had the unpleasant and unwanted responsibility of carrying the deadweight of her daft husbands.
Women were portrayed as aggressive and demanding. They rarely stayed at home to care for their own children. They were working professionals capable of doing it “all.” They were always portrayed as the smart, strong leader who got things done.
Remember the perfume commercial that declared “I can bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan, and never, ever let you forget you’re a man”? The inference was that mothers can be the breadwinner, the homemaker and the sexy wife day after day. Certainly, this is possible. But anyone who has ever raised a family, and/or juggled two careers understands that reality is usually quite different. Something always has to give.
The media’s portrayal of children changed dramatically at the same time. Early TV children were realistically inexperienced and emotionally and intellectually immature, needing all the guidance and wisdom that alert, patient and loving parents could muster. Young kids were recognized as easily misled, naïve, usually wrong and reliant on their parents as infallible sources of wisdom, correction and life experiences. As they grew in knowledge and wisdom, parents were always respected. During the 70s and 80s, children transformed into the social conscience of the family. As they became more technologically astute, they were portrayed as “superior” and parents as “inferior” in knowledge, wisdom and understanding. The kids had all the inside information, the best lines, and they viewed their parents as cultural dolts.
But nothing turned the family on its head more than Disney. From the beginning, mothers were either missing, dead or were killed during the story to kickstart the child’s emotional journey toward self-reliance. If mothers were kept alive, they were usually the evil stepmother!
Fathers, at best, were usually a distant authority figure (like a busy King) or an overbearing authority figure who was stubborn and unwilling to listen–ruling with an iron fist. At worst, many Disney fathers became emotionally useless in a crisis because of their own limitations or patriarchal trauma. The child always had to rebel and leave them behind to save themselves or solve their problem. Today, Disney portrays openly homosexual characters, normalizes trans and “non-binary,” and hosts “Pride Nites.” Mickey Mouse features in a prominent LGBTQ program.
People will defend Disney as just entertainment. Sure. But the entertainment we choose is a powerful teaching tool and it is being intentionally and successfully used to undermine the legitimacy of the family and undermine the morality of young people. Never underestimate how incredibly impressionable young children are.
All of this feeds the most current and egregious attack on the family, the cultural rot of “adultism”. We wrote about it here and in last week’s Series #2.
The NEA’s 2026 National Conference held a workshop to train teachers to identify and renounce their systemic “adultism,” defined as an unequal balance of power; systemic prejudice; a stereotype and discrimination against young people based on the assumption that adults are inherently superior in knowledge and virtue. Adultism is a Marxist concept promoted to undermine legitimate adult authority over children. It promotes youthful rebellion against parents, teachers, pastors and counsellors and strips young people of the God-given, loving protection parents and other authority figures provide.
You can see where this is headed. Teaching disrespect and disdain for authority including parental authority leaves them vulnerable to waves of immature, inexperienced, emotional rage, stirred up by powerful social influencers. The Proverbs of Solomon (1:8) state it well:
Listen, my son, to your father’s instruction and do not forsake your mother’s teaching. They will be a garland to grace your head and a chain to adorn your neck.
Rejection of authority was carried to its bloody conclusion with the Red Guard in the Chinese Cultural Revolution. Everyone should read Xi Van Fleet’s book, Mao’s America: A Survivor’s Warning. She survived the brutal Red Guard as a child in China, and she “sees signs of the same Cultural Marxism that ravaged her birth country of China threatening to destroy the America she now calls home.”
Thus, the attack on the family destabilizes children emotionally and psychologically, and is a major factor in the declining mental health of children. They have been taught there is no genuine truth and that they can’t trust anybody, including their parents!
Children are being taught to distrust the most important source of their protection and meaning. Their very own family. The very people who love them the most, who are looking out for their well-being and planning and sacrificing for their future. Their parents who encourage, coach, and correct. It’s their parents who set expectations and teach values, morals and beliefs. And it’s their parents who let them have the last bit of the ice cream or read one more story even when they are dogged tired. It’s families where children learn respect, generosity, kindness, courage, making wise decisions and personal responsibility.
So, one action we can take right now is to become more intentional with our families. Have the hard discussions. Choose healthier educational environments. Be their cheerleaders but also their guidance system. And above all, teach them the proper respect for the different roles of family members. Teach them that the beauty and God given design of the family is for their blessing and protection. Plan fun events. Be present when you are with them. Turn off devices. Turn off the screens. Turn off the wifi.
The destruction of the traditional family has been the primary goal of Cultural Marxists for decades because the family is the single greatest obstacle blocking their total takeover. When families crumble and parental authority is undermined, outside influences rush in with the “fixes.” And children suffer every time.
Nancy Pearcey summed this reality up perfectly in a recent post.
In Part 4 we will take a closer look at how boys are particularly being targeted and discuss what parents can do.