The Goode Family -- More than Good

Finally, after many weeks of waiting, I finally got to see a few episodes of ABC's "The Goode Family." I think it's good comedy, and not just because it skewers the left. That's a bonus, certainly, especially when we get lines like this:

Gerald Goode: My point is maybe we shouldn't be so judgmental. Don't we always try to celebrate people's differences and learn from them?

Helen Goode: Sure, if they're like Native Americans or backwards rainforest tribes, but not these people!

These people, of course, are people who know what condoms and contraceptives are but believe that -- gasp -- abstinence is the best way to avoid having unwanted children.

Critics and such either loathe the show -- they're offended at how save-the-earthers are portrayed in the show or how they fuzzy notion of culture-worship that excludes anything Eurocentric -- or believe that since some conservatives are "sulking" that the show will be quickly dropped by ABC because it's not politically correct enough.

I just think it's damned funny. Where else can you get an exchange like this:

Gerald: We can't let her sleep in our potting shed.

Helen: But we can't impose our Western notion of comfort on her. Making her sleep inside on a bed would be cultural imperialism.

So Makinkin, the Burmese pen-pal Helen has had for 30 years gets to sleep in the potting shed and miss out on the comforts of indoor showers with running water and microwave ovens (not because the Goodes won't let her use them, but because nobody in the house uses them because they're energy-wasters) sleeps in the potting shed, all while Helen revels in harboring a refugee. "Almost no one gets to do that," she exults.

Even better is when she takes Makinkin to the One Earth organic food store to show her off to the one-uppity Margot, who fumes that Helen gets a refugee before she does "How did you get one? I'm on a list!" Margot says.

I trust Mike Judge, the brain behind "The Goode Family," will keep the comedy coming. And as long as ratings are good, I don't see ABC shoving this show under the rug.