Speaking of parents or grandparents forcing children to watch shows... I kid you not I was probably 8 years old and my mom had made me watch the Wizard of Oz about 50 times already. I was playing baseball with my friends In the field by our house and my mother came out there and dragged me by my ear all the way home to watch the Wizard of Oz AGAIN! I was screaming at her the whole way home and she kept saying shut up it's a classic!. To this day I refuse to watch that movie ever again.
You know something no one has mentioned Knight Rider as a classic. Or one of my favorites Air Wolf. Maybe I am just that much younger I don't know. But there were plenty of things like Candid Camera,I think someone mentioned Captain Kangaroo, Bonanza, Gun smoke, Dukes of Hazard, Tour of duty, M.A.S.H, Cheers, Night Court, Mr. Wizard, Reading Rainbow, Mr. Rogers, the smurfs, fraggle rock, Thundercats, He-man, Voltron not the early episodes but the later ones when they were cats, the Snorks, Care Bears, Strawberry short cake, The muppets, The Flintstones, The Jetsons, and that's all I can think of right now. But every one of these shows my kids know nothing about.