The People Who Use Their Parents’ First Name
On a 1971 episode of The Brady Bunch, the family’s eldest son, Greg, decides that, as a freshly minted high schooler, he ought to be treated like a man. When he asks for his own bedroom, his parents acquiesce. When he asks for money to buy new clothes, they give it to him. When he asks to skip the family camping trip, they say okay.
But when he sits down at the breakfast table and calls his parents by their first name—“Morning, Carol! Morning, Mike!”—well,
