'Goode' good? You be the Judge

According to a quote widely attributed to Gandhi, there are four stages of winning hearts and minds: "First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win." Well, the good news is that environmentalism, and in particular veganism, has now officially arrived at that second stage.

Debuting tonight (9 p.m., ABC) is The Goode Family, a Mike ("Beavis & Butthead," "King of the Hill") Judge animated sitcom that takes aim at the very notion of doing good - or at least, doing good in a trendy way. The Goodes are an earnest "green" family drawn in such broad tones as to signal Judge's intent to mock everything in Earth to Philly's coverage area. Whether Judge and his ABC cohorts actually have anything to say here remains to be seen.

Of course, it's not as if there's a lack material for humor in the "green" realm. The very notion of "one person can change the world" can either come across as empowering or "righteous" (the corrolary adjective is "defensive," which describes anyone who objects to being called "righteous").

In fact, the Daily News is host to one of the most pitch-perfect examples of finding laughs in the efforts of a family to go green, Signe Wilkinson's "Family Tree" comic strip. "Family Tree" works because Signe draws humor out of everyday situations and choices made by believable, likable but imperfect people. From Ellen Gray's review, and from ABC's promo video, that doesn't look to be Judge's M.O. here.

One hint: The entire Goode family is vegan - even the dog! Only get this - the dog is secretly feasting on neighborhood pets to satisfy his primal hunger for meat! Har har - how could this family refuse to acknowledge that dogs need meat?

Well, in actual fact, they don't - unlike cats, dogs are not biologically carnivores, and if you've seen enough dogs devouring vegan food with dog-frenzy relish (I have) you would know this trope is more wishful thinking than character revelation. It's a "funny" set-up, yes, but one that also supports the mainstream default attitude of "Why try to change the world? Don't bother." I'm wondering how much of the show will have the same underlying "joke" behind the gags.

Again, though, if we've gotten to the laughing-at stage, it shows veganism is getting wider notice (last night, in fact, "vegan" actually showed up as a Jeopardy answer - one the contestant got right!), so those of us who advocate for making a difference when you sit down to eat should probably refrain from slamming the show even if it winds up being offensively ignorant. For such a "righteous" subclass, it's probably best to err on the side of laughing along for now. If the show winds up taking hold (questionable, since ABC announced it last fall then pushed it into the summer rerun season), it will provide many jumping-off points for discussions of this and other kinds of activism.

All in all, a sense of humor always comes in handy. That was my mantra a little over a decade ago when Laugh Lines Press published my collection of vegetarian cartoons (I wasn't yet a vegan): Since the underlying issues are pretty grave, I said, we need all the laughs we can get. So with that in mind I'll watch tonight and follow up here with my impressions, and I invite you to do the same (add your comment below or send me an email).

Granted, the pilot episode of a show is usually more broadly sketched than the rest, which in this case is gonna mean reeeally broad, but who knows? Over time, with continued exposure to the issues involved, Judge may turn out to have something to say - maybe something he doesn't even plan on now. I mean, people can evolve. One of my most trenchant cartoons, I thought, in the aforementioned book was one about a family so fervent in their vegetarianism that they had "vegetarian dogs." I showed the dogs regarding a human baby with primal hunger - how could the family not know, after all, that dogs need meat? Ha!

With that in mind, I'll try to avoid jumping into "righteous / defensive" mode while viewing the first episode. With enough effort, I believe I'll be able to put it off until at least six minutes into week two.