I’m not a father, but I am vaguely aware of the children’s show Bluey. From my understanding, it’s one of those shows that preschool kids love to watch religiously, and the parents watch with their kids and interact because it’s great when parents do things with their kids.
Dale Earnhardt Jr’s two daughters apparently love Bluey. While Bluey does a great job depicting more modern family roles and having positive parental figures, it may not be the most realistic portrayal of a family whose parents have to go out and make a living. Young kids may not fully understand why their mom and/or dad may not be playing with them as often as it happens on the show.
As Earnhardt talked with The Athletic’s Jeff Gluck, the conversation got to Bluey, and Earnhardt revealed his issue with the show. While Earnhardt feels that he does his best to be with his kids, the show creates an unrealistic expectation that no parent in real life can possibly match.
“The thing that annoys me about ‘Bluey’ is — I’m gonna be completely transparent — I think I’m a really good dad,” Earnhardt said. “I’m pretty happy about my dad-ing. I feel like I’m present in their lives, I’m available for them and they know where I’m at.
“But we watch ‘Bluey’ and the kids are like, ‘Come on, Dad, do this. Come on, Dad, pretend this.’ So every episode, my kids watch Bluey and see the dad is like the kids’ best friend. Always available. Always there. Anytime they want the dad to get in on the fun or to play, he’s never too busy. He’s never got to go to work. He’s never got this thing he’s got to do or he’s never mowing the lawn and whatever, right? It’s always, ‘Yep, you got it. I’m gonna do what the kids want me to do and pretend with them.’ So my girls, mainly Isla (who just turned 5), they have the same expectation of me.
“Isla says this multiple times a day: ‘Hey, Dad, pretend this.’ And I never say anything about it because I know you’re supposed to let them pretend. You’re supposed to let them create and imagine. But the dad on ‘Bluey,’ he is setting these expectations for our own children that are unrealistic. Because my daughter thinks, ‘Oh, yeah, my dad should do that. My dad will do that. We’ll ask him to do it and he’s gonna do it.’
“I’m sure some people will have different opinions about all that. I’d be curious to hear others’ opinions. I know somebody is going to say, ‘There will come a day when nobody is going to be asking you to pretend anymore and you’re going to be so sad.’ And I know that’s coming. I’m not wishing my life away. But ‘Bluey’ makes things challenging because the expectations are high.”
Maybe the point is for parents to strive to be better than they already are, but there can be a danger of setting unrealistic expectations. I know I would be upset when I was that age if my dad wasn’t around or was too tired to play. Now that I’m in my 30s, I get that my dad couldn’t because he was in the military and served in Desert Storm, but I wasn’t going to understand that when I was 5.
Although, turn it the other way around. When I was a kid, I didn’t exactly appreciate my parents seeing who they felt was perfect on TV and setting unrealistic expectations for me even though I felt, and many others felt, that I was a smart and well-behaved kid.
Either way, it’s nice that Earnhardt spends as much time as he can with his daughters. And eventually, they’ll understand why you weren’t able to play with them as much as Bandit was able to do on the show.
