All in the Family by Kennan Ferguson

Reactions to Family Guy and Disability

In Chapter 2 titled, “The Functioning Family” from his book All in the Family, Ferguson analyzes the family’s role in political theory. In short, family is the most fundamental building block from which our society is based on. He uses various quotes such as, “The family has centralized power for the contemporary nation.” (Ferguson 22), “The family acts as a nidus, in which human concerns, conflicts, and cares rest.” (Ferguson 23), and “The family is important precisely because it is the locus of negotiations of unity and difference.” (Ferguson 24) Family is the place that shapes who we are, and in part motivates our actions. We are not inclined to act against our family’s ideals. It is very useful that Ferguson points out how our nuclear family directly and indirectly formulates our ideals and our actions.

In saying all of this, it can be argued that family is the main reason for why establishing justice for people with disabilities is not at the forefront of our minds. Family personalizes the political by putting human passions in the realm of the legitimate. This can be a good thing, but it also establishes normalities in our society. Often these normalities leave out the different and underrepresented. Most families in this country do not have to deal with the day to day responsibility of having a disabled person in their household. Those that do, recognize that people with disabilities need more inclusion in our society. Ferguson has an alarming quote when he states, “We care far more about those close to us than we do about those who can change the world.” (Ferguson 26) If the issue is not in our family, at times we become blind to the needs of others. Family ideals disable us from truly developing a third-person perspective for the world.

  

In the video above, people are asked about what they think of Family Guy making fun of people with disabilities. While I’m not a gambling man, I would assume that those in the video, who found the subject funny, did not have people with disabilities in their family, and vice-versa. On a more positive note, it seems that everyone recognized the satire criticizing our society in the video. My overall point though still stands, the reason Family Guy satirically points this issue out is because our families have established preconceptions regarding people with disabilities. These preconceptions have been translated to our society because of the important role family plays in structuring our society.

References:

Ferguson, Kennan 2012, "All in the Family", 22-31