How I Met Your Mother is a wee gem of a television series. I don't generally watch American comedy, I found Friends to be insipid, and Seinfeld as far as I could determine was a series that consisted of a neurotic group of New Yorkers being neurotic... wow. How I Met Your Mother however I find to be consistently funny, and as a big plus it is somewhat, at the least, 'libertarian' friendly, while not particularly political in theme or plot, the way the series deals with (albeit briefly though frequently) things such as guns, drugs, alcohol, and tobacco is very refreshing. Typically all the above are treated negatively in most modern television, guns are dangerous, drugs are life wrecking and smoking is a big nono. The characters consist of a group of professionals: an architect, a lawyer, a news anchor, a kindergarten teacher and 'Barney' whose actual profession is never revealed (though he wears a suit, has a nice apartment and works for a "big evil corporation").

The interesting points which to me are atypical of modern sitcoms:

The lawyer character gives up his dream of working for an environmental lobby group in favour of a higher salary at a private firm. This is pretty much treated as a positive.

The gun owner is an ex-pat Canadian female. She also drinks single malt and smokes cigars.

They all smoke pot at one time or another without any particularly negative consequences.

Scenes often take place in a bar, where alcohol consumption is social and "normal" - again without negative consequences.

Some of the characters have casual sex - sometimes while drunk - with no particular finger wagging, disapproving moral to the story.

The series does not "glamourise" drugs, smoking, booze or sex, but it does treat them as normal pleasure pursuits that people can safely indulge in (or in the case of guns - safely own). Thoroughly enjoyable.

On a further note, if your distaste with American sitcoms is like mine, where the characters are too "over the top" i.e. they don't respond reasonably or realistically to the world and people around them, you'll find HIMYM to be a little more grounded with a nice balance between exaggeration for well crafted comedic effect and realism.