I’ve been watching a few episodes of “Clarissa Explains It All” and it amazes me how underlyingly political it was. In the Darling household, there is perpetual tension between different political philosophies ranging from across the spectrum, each personified by a different member of the family: Clarissa (liberal, feminist, perhaps liberal Democrat), Ferguson (Republican, possibly Libertarian), the mom (fascism, compassionate conservatism, perhaps conservative Democrat), and the dad (Marxism, Socialism, McGovernikism). Clarissa’s friend Sam, of course, represents the indecisive nomadic individual who incessantly gravitates to and from whatever the latest pop political trend is (i.e. metrosexualism, “South Park Republican”, “Crunchy Conservatism”) – just look how easily he adapts to “surfer culture” in the episode “No TV”.
Someday I’ll analyze all this at length in an essay tentatively entitled “Political and Social Fragmentation Within the Total Complex of Relations Between People Living as Parts of Late 20th Century American Society’s Immediate and Extended Families: Clarissa Explains It All”.
