Foobonia and Points West.

Here's another golden oldie given a bit of a remix: one of the penalties you pay for being as clannish as the Foobs have become lately is that you over-estimate your importance to the community. Now I know I've hammered in the point that these people think if they're not involved in something the Sun will die and the World come to an end but that's just not the case. They're so transfixed by Fooby groupthink they've lost the ability to see themselves as other people do. Let's say, for sake of argument, the Patterson family all leave town for some reason: Mike pulls his head out of his ass (or, more likely, Deanna pulls it out for him) and moves the Pattersons Redux to a loft in Toronto, Liz gets a job in Sarnia and John, Elly and April move to Vancouver. Who'd notice that they're not around? Sure, the neighborhood grew up around them but they don't seem to have really made themselves part of it. Besides, what little people DO know of the Patterson family probably doesn't inspire respect or admiration anyway. Since nobody really knows (or likes) them, their dispersal wouldn't be that much of a problem. The only thing I can think of that people might worry about is that someone even more irritating would move in.

There are also people racing around the happy land of Foobdom whom Lynn sees as good influences. Their function is to give the character they're associated with 'good' advice. Whether you'd follow this advice in the real world, however is open to question. The prototype for these 'helpful' people is John's college pal and cautionary example Ted McCaulay. This worthy's philosophy is a fourth-hand distillation of that repugnant old goat, Hugh Hefner. The walking punchline is so vain and silly as to stagger the mind. Lynn thinks it mildly humorous that the peewee playboy bunks with his mother, when outside the charmed land of Foobonia he'd be mocked as the puke-inducing loser he is. Luckily for him and us, John takes this hamster's dubious ideas with a salt lick. If only his son were as sharp. He wouldn't be stuck with cartoon bohemian Josef "Weed" Weeder. In the hateful and unnecessary running battle with his 'domineering monster' of a mother-in-law, Weed can always be counted on to warn Mikey to do the Fooby thing and not let her 'have hand' instead of the decent, sane thing and buy peace with the poor woman. He and heroic ethnic joke Lovey Saltzman also gave Prince Jackass of Foobonia super-good and noble counsel in the war with their cardboard troll downstairs neighbors that wouldn't ever pointlessly antagonize normal people and lead to a needless mess. Speaking of 'needless messes', Lynn probably ascribes the chaos that is her middle child's love life to her acceptance of the dubious suggestions of her teacher, Miss Edwards, with its scary concept of independence, especially independence from Elly. I mean, come on, her 'independence' put her in a wheelchair, dammit, not some drunk. Mr Glug-glug, Vroom-vroom, Thump-thump was obviously doing the work of the Foob god. Leave it to Lynn to make physical disability a moral judgment. She contrasts the wrong-thinking healthy active woman forced into dependence with the noble Shannon who will be hanging around Mommy for good. All Lizardbreath needs is a good man to 'save' her, by which she means a mind-numbingly dull existence with the appalling drone, Anthony.
You'll notice I didn't mention Anthony's boss, working-class hero and childhood buddy of Mikerobe, Gordon. He's now more or less part of John's world and therefore as close to living a reality-based life as anyone in Foobonia can.
The good advice these junior-grade Foobs give can be boiled down to two principles:

1) Stay the course - You're doing super!

and

2) There's no place like (the Patterson) home.

This sort of puzzles me, because I certainly wouldn't wanna live next to them.