the idea of a woman having 8 kids is preposterous these days
but i loved 8 is enough
i saw repeat overseas and the dialogue was intense and interesting
i hope they bring back on tv land
or bring out the dvd
The family of today is so much smaller. There are still some families with 8 kids but it is rare. Still the show is one of the best. T.V. shows these days could learn a lesson from Eight Is Enough. If more were like it they would last longer. It was shown recently in reruns in Canada. One show I never get sick of seeing.
shareSame with me. I will never ever get tired of this show. And, as far as the DVDs, I waiting for that day. This might be the only tv show Id wver buy on DVD. Cuz theyre so expensive, buying all seasons. But this is worth it by a long shot. *sigh* cmon ppl! release it already!
P.S. I know a family that has 6 kids lol. pretty close. and have heard of ppl these days with 10 to 15 kids. real
Movie Time!
Well, don't forget that this show began almost 30 years ago. Yes, 8 was unusual, but not as unusual as it is today, I suppose. There's even a scene in the pilot where Mary asks her mother, Joan, why they had such a big family in a time when families were getting smaller. Of course, I don't remember the answer, which is another good reason this show should be released on DVD.
shareI've been enjoying watching EIE every day from 2-3 p.m. central time on MeTV on cable. If you have Comcast digital cable, it's channel 223. I was so excited to see the repeats show up! The memories!
I'd forgotten how unlikeable Susan (the redhead) was. What a complainer! She was a real smartmouth who was the first to criticize her father. Yuck!
"Why don't you stop annoying people?"
"Oh, I'm sorry-- HEY!"
>>I'd forgotten how unlikeable Susan (the redhead) was. What a complainer! She was a real smartmouth who was the first to criticize her father. Yuck!<<
Remember when she went platinum blonde in the last season and acted all loony? She also married that southern-fried yokel and moved into the garage(!). Abby tried to kill her by getting into that car accident, but it didn't work.
I believe the mother explained (as nicely as possible) that the majority of the 8 were mistakes.
shareI do seem to recall Joan telling Mary than some of the kids were accidents...although she was tactful enough not to mention which ones...but you can best believe Nicholas was probably one of those accidents....and we can probably deduce some of those stair steps in the middle were too.
shareHow stupid. Sort of depends where you are, doesn't it? Also, since Catholics are forbidden from using birth control, I think you may be a tad off base here. Or are you implying that no Catholic follows what the Pope says... oh, wait, that would mean none of them are Catholics anymore...
shareCorrection; It is a sin for Catholics to use ARTIFICIAL birth control. Natural birth control methods are acceptable to the Church.
In the Catholic Church we are NOT forbidden! There are things that true Catholic believe in and so if you believe in them how can they be forbidden? It's not logical to be forbidden something when you believe in it. If you don't believe in what the Catholic Church teaches, then how can you call yourself a Catholic?
BTW the Bradfords' religion was never discussed in the show, so we don't know if they were Catholic, Protestant, non-religious or had some other religion. As for the real family "Eight is Enough" was based on, I don't remember Tom Braden mentioning religion in his book. Maybe Tom and Joan had a lot of kids because they wanted them and it had nothing to do with religion.
"I'd rather believe what I believe and be wrong than believe what you believe and be wrong."
Yes, thank you for that--you're correct in a sense, however "natural birth control"="no birth control." Rhythm fall just above withdrawl for reliability, and anyone that actually believes this is some form of birth control is kidding themselves.
Not sure about your second paragraph there, I gave up trying to figure out what it said after five minutes.
Second paragraph: A true Catholic believes in what the Catholic Church believes. The Catholic Church believes that artificial birth control goes against nature and God's will. Therefore if you are a true Catholic you will believe the same thing. And if you don't believe in artificial birth control just like the Catholic Church does, then how can you even consider artificial birth control forbidden? It can't be forbidden if you believe it is wrong. That is what I meant.
BTW I'm reading the book Eight is Enough, and it is very clear the Braden family is not Catholic.
"I'd rather believe what I believe and be wrong than believe what you believe and be wrong."
I do agree that you really don't see families of this size in this day and age, but I don't know if that necessarily means that a show like this wouldn't work on TV today.
shareYou are right, in that having eight children would be very unusual today (and really since about the 1950s). It was very common, however, to have around that many, or even more, in the 1800s and early 1900s. And there were 8 in my maternal grandmother's family. I sometimes thought of them in comparison to this family, and they were exactly reversed gender wise, in that there were three sisters and five brothers in her family. But about the series itself, I watched it occasionally on ABC in the late 1970s/early 1980s, and liked it pretty good. And I then watched it occasionally in syndication in the 1980s, including some in summer, 1987. And I then made a point to watch its reunion movie when it aired on Sunday night, October 18, 1987, and really liked it (and the 20th anniversary of this movie will be Thursday btw).
"I happen to be a vegetarian". Lex, from Jurrasic Park
HEY! There are 8 kids in my family!
shareI knew a family with eight kids in suburban L.A. back in the early 90s. Their oldest boy later served as a battalion commander in Iraq. His name is Danjel Bout. He has an online blog about his wartime experiences. You can look it up.
shareNow we've got "Jon and Kate Plus Eight," though I doubt it's on much longer.
Tom and Abby got married in the Presbyterian Church, so I always figured they were Presbyterian.
I love Jesus, but I drink a little.
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Both Kate's pregnancies were the result of fertility treatments, so they definitely weren't accidents or natural occurrences.
I love Jesus, but I drink a little.
Good post. I was going to bring that up when I saw the subject
No offense, but you're an idiot.
you have to remember that these kids were born in the 1950's when it was even uncommon for married families to have ready access to contraceptives.
The birth control pill and several other methods were not developed yet. So of course families would be large. Also it was cheaper to raise a family back then too.
Much more of a social services network--you got taxed more but things also cost a lot less too. So it was cheaper to have a larger family. People expected to live far modestly than we do now with smaller families.
Taxes were cut in the 1980's under the idea that everybody deserved to live like the 1 percent. Yes but they had smaller families bc (also pre-airline deregulation) the rich could afford to go to countries to obtain resources for reproductive health care. .