1 yr. ago • 92%

Anyone else get the sense that Netflix's home improvement shows are normalizing religious nutbags?

It seems like they are cutting as much symbolism as they can out of the shots they decide to keep in the show but every other episode feels like " We're a family with 9 kids and everyone is homeschooled. Oh yeah and we just happen to be active in our church too."

Like, no shit you're active in the church.. Normal people do not have a quiver full of isolated kids like that. It's not normal or healthy.

30 comments

One solution is to cancel Netflix. Between having jack shit to watch, raising prices and forcing an industry to strike, they don’t deserve your money.

58
learn to sail, you're only truly free on the 7 seas

33
Is this a Netflix thing or a home improvement thing? I suspect it's the latter.

16
- I suspect it's more of a "who applies to have their homes remodeled by complete strangers" thing. Answer: somebody whose broke enough they can't do the remodels themselves.
  
  21
  
  Isn't that the vast majority of people?
  
  9
Eh I’m pretty fine with using a service that doesn’t pander specifically to me

7
Don't watch the show if you don't like it

-3
- Obviously I'm not continuing to watch. Like my original post said, I was more concerned about Netflix normalizing these people.
  
  5
  
  Normalizing what? People being religious? I hate to break it to you, but people being religious is pretty damn normal regardless of what Netflix is doing. You act like there aren't large families out there that aren't religious and that somehow families with shit tons of kids is something exclusive to religious people, it's not
  
  -3
What's wrong with having a big family? Who cares if they are active in their church? Nobody is forcing you to watch.

Edit: You atheists down vote with fervor not unlike a religious cult. You're more alike than you think 🤠

-136
- I grew up in a big family like this. All of us are deeply scarred. What's lurking beneath the surface in most of these families is severe neglect from parents, sexual abuse from unsupervised and confused siblings or older relatives, catastrophically underdeveloped social skills. No parents can properly raise 9 children at once. It's an environment that creates adults with no boundaries and no self esteem and tons of hidden trauma.
  
  96
  
  Thanks for sharing, very interesting and sad insight.
  
  24
  
  Edit: I just realized that the context OP is talking about is a quite a bit different than what I am talking about.
  
  --
  
  It can work, but it literally has to be a community effort to raise that many kids. I come from a small family, but my wife didn't. She is Asian and she has 7 siblings. However, she grew up in a very strong, multifamily community that have all been close since they escaped Laos at the tail end of the Vietnam war.
  
  Everyone tries to help for the most part and generally everyone has the same values between the different families. Kids just kinda grew up in several different houses at once around a ton of family and that is just how it was.
  
  I can't really say that I know all the nuances of being raised in a large family, but when I started dating my wife 20+ years ago, I can say they just pulled me right into fold. It has been an interesting journey so far.
  
  10
  
  Just because your parents weren't capable doesn't mean all parents aren't capable. Stop projecting your trauma onto others.
  
  -33
- Yes, religious cults are famous for their mass downvoting sprees on the internet.
  
  What the fuck are you even talking about man? People just think what you said is stupid. But if it makes you feel any better I didn’t downvote your post.
  
  34
  
  It's the fervor nonce, not the down voting.
  
  -15
- Families that large almost always parentify the older children, thus robbing them of their own childhood.
  
  Also, as somebody who has had to teach teenagers who had previously been "home schooled".... It's rough. They are usually not schooled at all. I'm talking 16- and 17-year-olds with a third grade reading level and a first grade math level. I wish I were exaggerating.
  
  28
- Lol stay mad
  
  17
  
  I was gonna respond, but yours is so much better.
  
  4
- Wait, how is downvoting in any way similar to anything a religious cult does? Just not liking what you say is cult behavior? Does everyone have to like everything you say?
  
  12
- You atheists down vote with fervor not unlike a religious cult.
  
  You're on an atheist magazine, champ. What do you expect when you post quazi-christian-apologist stuff here?
  
  10
- We only have 4 options, up vote, down vote, ignore and block.
  
  6
- Atheist here, I agree. Nobody forcing me to watch, have a big family, or go to church. Right now I'm watching Suits and the Witcher. I'm not a capitalist or a magic using monster hunter.
  
  2

You've viewed 30 comments.