Re. latter point, polic sci mainstream pines for stereotypical/mythical two-parent family that sits down together at dinner table and talks about "issues of the day." Michael Hoover
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For list amusement here is a little story about my not quite functional two-parent family, sitting down together for dinner and talking about the issues of the day back when Norman Rockwell was doing covers for the Saturday Evening Post and Life.
Imagine a somewhat large ranch style house in the Los Angeles suburbs. It's dinner in the kitchen on a Friday night in late Spring in the magic that was 1959. Moms is quitely eating, Stepdad is woofing it down, and the snot-nosed sixteen year old isn't really looking for a fight because he is going out with his friends as soon as his buddy can get away from an equally boring dinner with the family and can come to pick him up.
>From some random comment of mine, I can't remember now what, my
stepfather launches into a rightwing diatribe on the virtues of the
constitution, to which I respond, `fuck the constitution'. That's it!
`Gawd dammned kid' he says, leaping from the table to grab me, but he
is big, about six foot two and weights about two hundred and thirty. I
dodge this lunge and take a swing at him going by, clipping him on the
side of the neck. I weight about one hundred and thirty and stand
about five foot five. He turns around and takes a round house that
hits me on the side of the head and I fly across the kitchen hitting
the open dishwasher door and get a gash behind my ear which bleeds a
huge amount, but is nothing serious. I scramble around on the floor to
get up before he does and we arrive together face to face and I take
wild swing at his face, but my reach is too short. He is wearing
glasses and can't judge distance and dodges the punch badly, hitting
himself in the face on the edge of an open cabinet door, breaking his
glasses. He curses and grabs his nose, thinking I have connected.
Just then my buddy knocks on the front door, which further enrages my
stepfather, who has slightly recovered and is getting ready to head
toward the front door. Meanwhile Moms is screaming and jumping up and
down in the kitchen, freaked beyond hysterical with blood and broken
eye glasses and food and a full blown fist fight on the kitchen floor. I run
out the front door and slam it as hard as I can, breaking one of the little
diagonal panes. I yell at my shocked and breathless buddy, Rick, to get in the
car. I proceed to the middle of the front lawn and scream as loud as I can for
the neighbor's benefit what an asshole my stepfather is, giving details about
fat, pig, glasses, rightwing, and so forth. I jump in Rick's car and he sees me
covered in blood and hits the gas. We're outta there.
I suddenly remember Rick smokes Marboro's which are terrible but borrow one anyway and try to relax with a smoke, wondering how I am going to get in the house later. I had forgotten my keys. I figure if it looks bad, I'll sleep in the orange grove across the street. We go over to Rick's to get a fresh T-shirt so I look okay to go to the movies. Rick is still in shock, although he is supposed to be my bad influence. His greaser pose didn't including going a couple rounds with Dad over politics. I am shaking all over, but it's just adrenaline and rage. Rick asks if I am okay looking worried. I mumble something about hating the fucker and we decide to go to a drive-in in Van Nyes, since I still don't looked too good with a big knot behind my ear and a bruise coming up on my cheek.
Ahh, those days of yore, sitting down to dinner with the family and talking about the issues of the day.
Politics is violence. Ethics is money. Morality is submission.
Chuck Grimes