I think Married With Children has managed to come through unscathed because of Ed O’Neil and who he is as a person. He’s so much the opposite of Al Bundy and has always been very open about that. The show as a result falls into that same category as South Park or All in the Family; We understand that the jokes are meant to be satire via absurdity; It’s so over the top and the actor is so different in real life that we just get it.

Compare that to something like Home Improvement, where we know that the humour isn’t meant to be absurdist, and we know that Tim Allen really is a douche.

It works in that show because the entire family are losers, and they all get mocked by all the others, regularly.

True equality, lol.