It seems to me that in the United States, the family has been replaced by the Squadron. --Frank Zappa
Frank Zappa called out television for what it really was:a tool for social engineering.
— Raymond (@Raymond82310289) July 30, 2025
He warned TV was being used to reshape values, dissolve the family structure,and raise kids more loyal to MSM than to their own parents.
The TV wasn’t entertainment -it was indoctrination. pic.twitter.com/cZkDsUy3Am
The reality is invented for you by people who choreograph it. There's got to be an office in Washington some place where a bunch of people that you have never heard of choreograph reality. It's not just what the next photo op is going to be, it's what is the interpretation of a given international event. And this has to be generally dispensed to the media with no questions asked.
The closest you would get to something really reflecting actual behavior and actual attitudes is what happens on Fox. Fox has shows which have a little bit more of a contemporary, realistic feel. So The Simpsons, Living Color, and the other thing that is very successful is Beverly Hills 90210. The interesting thing about Bundy like characters in all sitcoms, the universal rule of all sitcoms is: fathers are weak. Fathers are bad. Mothers are wise. This has been with us since the 1950s, and this has sent a very bad psychological message to the entire society. It has made fatherhood almost a criminal activity, and a lot of people would be dissuaded from ever becoming a dad based on the images that are presented to the public from American television shows, and this goes all over the world. And you know what, American dads lived up to the image. They eventually became just as stupid and ineffectual as . . . there's plenty of real Bundys out there. That's the reason why that show resonates. With each Administration, they get to nominate the people that they want to sit on the FCC, and the FCC, although it's not chartered as a censorship organization, they do censor either directly or by influence or by threatening people's licenses. And so certain things just don't go on air.
. . . because the news isn't just the story. It's how often they repeat the story, what the tone of voice is that is used to set up the story, how the story is actually photographed, whether or not they bring on a so-called expert to explain the story. It seems to me that in the United States, the family has been replaced by the Squadron. If you look at MTV and the way the dancers are set up, young people group together in squadrons. They have terms like, "Me and my crew." Nobody's got a family because who wants to hang out with a dad? Dads are like Bundy's. Then again if you live in a neighborhood where they don't have gangs, your other options are you belong to the football team, which is another kind of a gang. Or you belong to some other thing, which is not a family. The family is an endangered species in this country. I think there is a nostalgia for families as an institution, but they're rapidly fading away. I mean more choice means more the same because the minute somebody comes up with something which is successful, the natural instinct of the American is to imitate it and just clone it and beat it to death just as . . . . The thing I find very ironic in today's political world is that we are always talking U.S. politics about how the Japanese never really invent anything, they just copied our stuff. Well, we just copy our stuff. We're chasing our tail here.
