While I agree with the notion that some well-placed, demoralizing-our-enemies humor is just the thing liberals need to embrace, this essay is all wrong about “South Park”. When they get political for the libertarian-right on “South Park”, their entire sense of humor flies out the window. I watch every episode until some person—usually a child or a member of disempowered minority—starts to sentimentally parrot some bullshit libertarian concept that’s not been thought through on any level past the bumper sticker stage, and I shut it off. It’s the same trick that “Day by Day” pulls by putting evil conservative ideas in the mouth of a hip young black man. The problem with that show, and it’s appeal to right wing morons, is not that it’s irreverent. It’s that it’s reverent, and of the most asinine shit ever.
Other than that, though, the show is damn funny.
103 Responses to “The humorless fuddy-duddies of “South Park””
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Entirely correct. I stopped watching after Big Gay Al declared his support for the Boy Scout gay ban.
The Britney Spears episode the other night was interesting, because they were actually very sympathetic towards here, which is not exactly common with “South Park.”
OTOH, my favorite episode is the one where Ben Affleck has a relationship with Cartman’s Jennifer Lopez hand, so there’s clearly something very wrong with me.
“Taco flavored kisses! Taco Taco Taco”
Well, yesterday’s was good.
but then, it doesn’t really take much actual insight to do a parody of Heavy Metal.
“You make me almost forget about… tacos.”
Yeah, I like that one too.
Yeah, when the libertarian B.S. starts up, it makes me want to hurl my copy of Atlas Shrugs at the TV, but that would require me to pull it out from under the cat’s litter box
Parker & Stone also get to “frame” the arguments.
Like having Token, the token black kid rail against hate crimes or affirmative action. Or have Richard Dawkins be a douche bag.
That’s usually when I switch on to something else.
Respect Mah Authoritah!!!
Like the earlier stuff and Christmas specials myself.
“I got you kind of! I got you kind of!”
But, yes, someone needs to tell Stone and Parker that it’s not really hip and new and alternative to parrot things that your grandparents used to say. Why not just cut to “Twenty-three skiddoo!”
“I stopped watching after Big Gay Al declared his support for the Boy Scout gay ban.”
At least that episode had the Boy Scouts being so in a twist over homos! as troop leaders! for the children! that they wound up completely missing the actual child molester by assuming that “het-married with kids” meant “safe and normal.” I couldn’t make it through the Man-bear-pig one, though, and the hate-crime one was just ridiculous.
Yeah, pretty much. South Park is usually funny, but at times it’s just annoying. But yeah, the Jennifer Lopez hand puppet is great. “I wanted to write you a poem or song or something but I have no talent.”
South Park is best when they take on movie cliches, which was also what was hilarious about Team America. My favorite of all time was the Junior Detectives one.
Nobody and nothing is sacred in South Park. I just watched the episode where the kids were “cheezing” - inhaling pissed off cat urine sprayed into their faces to cause halucinatory drug trips. Absolutely outrageous lampooning of Fox News - the latest drug craze and how it is killing YOUR kids, etc.
Then there is the Pious episode. Precious.
So I’ll accept that levorotatory sacred cows get it once in a while too, because they seem to be totally equal opportunity with the South Park treatment.
I’m also fond of the episodes that really dive into kid culture. Like the one where the girls had a list of the hottest boys, and it turns out that some of the choices were deeply political and not at all reflective of their true opinions? Fucking genius.
I had problems with an episode years ago wherein anti-drug fanatics would say: “I’m an ultra-liberal, so i believe the ends justify the means.” That just mystified me. Ultra-liberals being anti-drug fanatics? Believing that the ends justify the means? It just didn’t make sense and i wasn’t sure what the joke was.
I did like when the formerly illiterate police chief gives up reading altogether after reading Atlas Shrugged.
The gooback episode is one for the ages - future beings don’t have good conditions, so they are emigrating through a time portal to steal all the jobs. Dead sacred cows everywhere - and a gay orgy too!
The Britney Spears episode the other night was interesting, because they were actually very sympathetic towards here, which is not exactly common with “South Park.”
I was surprised, too. The portrayal of the relentless hounding of Spears was quite scathing — the theme being that we (as society) catapult young women to celebrity status only to savagely tear them down and throw them away when we tire of them or when they get too old or whatever. The reference to the “The Lottery” was a nice twist as well.
The episode where they made fun of the crackpot beliefs on which the Mormon religion was founded is my recent personal favorite, but then I am a redneck bigot. Dum-de-dum-dum-dum!
I pretty much stopped watching after the season where Cartman got Scott Tenorman to eat his parents. There really weren’t many other places to go after than, I figured, and it looks like I was right.
It might just be my inherent distrust of the word normal, but I got to this point in the article
and though it would be better if I stopped reading. ugh.Some extremely normal but very sweet friends of ours have us over to play games with other couples — no, its not like *that* — and one of the games is this one where you draw a card with a famous person’s name on it and have to get your partner to name that person by describing them. The more names you get before the egg timer runs out, the higher the score, etc.
When it got to be our turn, Mrs. F drew a card and said “Taco taco!” and I immediately said “Hennifer Looopez!”. Everyone was just agog: they had no idea how or why we were able to do that. I finally realized that South Park had given us mad skills.
I always thought they were lampooning the libertarian crap. I never for a moment thought that I was supposed to take it seriously. The “moral” of the episode was always just as idiotic as everything else, so I figured it was all satire.
Incertus Brian:
That was where I stopped watching as well. Good to know it wasn’t just me.
Britney 1.0 was a comment on our MSM hounding a willing and active participant in the media circus. ‘The Lottery’ be a bit safer than lynching a scapegoat, and sooo LibertEntitledarian.
I grew up on South Park. Personally I don’t mind the whole “message of the week” thing, since I don’t take it very seriously. But South Park has been pretty boring and lazily written the last few weeks. And last season’s finale was one of the dullest episodes they’ve ever done.
They’re on the same level as the Simpsons to me, so I won’t stop watching because I know it could get great again at some point. But it’s disappointing.
“The gooback episode is one for the ages - future beings don’t have good conditions, so they are emigrating through a time portal to steal all the jobs.”
They took out jeeeerbs!
I always thought they were lampooning the libertarian crap. I never for a moment thought that I was supposed to take it seriously. The “moral” of the episode was always just as idiotic as everything else, so I figured it was all satire.
Exactly. Like I said, nothing is sacred to these guys. Just because they aren’t consistently on “our” side doesn’t mean that they aren’t consistent. That is part of what makes it a fun - if sometimes painful - show to watch.
Dig that generation X bone with the Lottery. Brilliant! Good Gawd, what 80s high school lit teacher didn’t show that short film repeatedly?
The episode where they made fun of the crackpot beliefs on which the Mormon religion was founded is my recent personal favorite, but then I am a redneck bigot. Dum-de-dum-dum-dum!
That’s part of what made the Scientology episode an instant classic — they had to have a constant “No, really, this is what they believe!” chyron on it. And if I hadn’t known ahead of time, I still would have thought they were joking.
Good Gawd, what 80s high school lit teacher didn’t show that short film repeatedly?
Mine, the year after I graduated. Some fundie parents got their panties in a wad that they were teaching kids to — gasp! — question authority! Can’t have that! So they banned teachers from showing it.
My high school was run by chickenshits, but I already knew that from going there.
The way South Park works is that if you tell them that there is some sacred cow then will start up the BBQ. They mock everyone which is good because everyone needs to be mocked.
The problem is that they worship sacred cows. That’s my point. They make sacred cows out of libertarian ideology. Like the Boy Scouts episode—they had fun mocking the sacred cows of homophobes, and then at the then erected a gold-plated sacred cow out of the right of private organizations to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation. It wasn’t fun. It wasn’t mocking a sacred cow. It was constructing one. They are funny as long as they are mocking, but they have their weak points.
(really hoping I’m not triple-posting this)
From what I’ve heard Parker and Stone more or less think taking a strong position on anything at all makes you an idiot because the world is too complicated to understand, or something to that effect. It’s radical centrism of the “truth must be somewhere in the middle” school, where you get to look like a sensible voice of reason without actually having to bother thinking about things.
They’re generally funny enough that even the righter-wing episodes are watchable. There’s a handful I can’t stand, but usually they’re so all over the place that it’s obvious they’re just goofing on whatever. The whole “South Park Republicans” thing sounds like a bunch of Republicans gave up on finding anyone who was both funny and conservative at the same time and decided to settle for “well, they make fun of liberals too” as the closest funny was ever going to get to them and live.
The Warcraft one is awesome.
Is it bad that it got me to start playing World of Warcraft?
Regarding sacred cows, Penn Jillette referred to this as a “gris-gris” on “Bullshit!” and announced their mission on the show was to get rid of each and every one. Unspoken: except for his own, of course. That’s why you’ll never see a “Libertarianism” episode of “Bullshit!”, despite the high degree of relevance.
The Warcraft one is awesome.
Seconded.
“How do you kill that which has no life?”
I can name a lot of South Park episodes I really like, but at a certain point, the prospect of being moralized to by a bunch of cartoons at 10 o’clock at night was enough to motivate me to find other things to watch. As Amanda said, they have sacred cows that they believe in and, annoyingly, feel the need to preach to me about. Perhaps what they’re doing is an homage to the “After School Special” format, but South Park doesn’t seem to mock the concept as much as reinforce it.
My favourite episode is the one where Cartman pretends to be a robot and gets tortured by Butters for most of the episode.
What can I say? The character annoys me.
Least favourite? The one where Stan’s dad has to go to an AA meeting and then starts acting like an alcoholic. It was fine right up until the end where they started moralizing about how avoiding alcohol completely wasn’t controlling oneself, and that alcoholics can just control themselves and drink moderately.
Parker, Stone? Stick with the silly stuff. You obviously don’t know shit about addiction, so shut up. And thanks for ruining that episode.
I loved that AA episode. Before that I never knew that 12 step programs were explicity religious. It had never even occured to me. Seems kind of fucked up really. Can atheists not attend?
Margalis:
I had an athiest friend inform that not all AA groups are preachy. The whole “give yourself to a higher power” idea does not necessarily mean God-centric, more of an acknowledgment that you by yourself, have fucked up your life, and you could use some guidance from others. The higher power can be your sponsor, the doorknob, whatever.
But of course, I am sure that there are some fundie AA’s too.
Margalis, there are atheistic or rather ‘non-religious format’ AA Groups — I go to one mainly because I like the people and the folks in the religious groups scare me — but I kind of question why they bother at all, having to throw out a good 75-90% of the material.
Still, seems to work for them.
There was a Rolling Stone article done on Parker and Stone last year of this month (I know because I still have it and just checked) and while it was informative both Parker and Stone come off as immature assholes. I was shocked by how turned off I was by their personal behavior. A few of the more colorful ones:
Parker had a contest for $5,000 to eat six Mcrib sandwiches and four Starbucks lattes in one sitting. The person who did this ended up vomiting and Parker made him drink up the vomit. (I’m guessing he “made” him drink it up so that he could get his $5,000, and not “made” him drink it back up period.) They also have a female friend who they liked to hold down and fart on, or they’d fart in her food or her face. I just remember reading it and thinking, “My god, that’s beyond juvenile,” but they got/get(?) away with it It’s the March 2007 issue if anyone’s interested.
Also, in the article they don’t believe that the term, “libertarian” is appropriate to call them and the “South Park Republican” label is dumb but Parker admits he doesn’t like to think about anything for too long and for the most part they refused to talk about their political beliefs.
I’m still a fan of South Park, like someone said I’ve grown up with it as well and while I think the stuff in their earlier years was funnier they do have some awesome shows every now and a again World of Warcraft, and the Scientology episodes being among them.
What I’m hearing here is what I always believed about South Park (man sees self in mirror of others, film at 11!); it’s hit or miss. Some episodes, they get over their own issues enough and it’s hilarious. Some other issues, they can’t quite bring themselves to slaughter their own sacred cows, and it sucks. What I hear Amanda saying is that it’s important to acknowledge their failings, since they are pretty serious, rather than get caught up in the rah-rah South Park Libertarians BS.
“The Warcraft one is awesome.
Is it bad that it got me to start playing World of Warcraft?”
Yes, it’s very bad.
And it happened to me too.
Brian and Greg, that episode was the first one to shock me, too- until that point, I really enjoyed the nutty insanity. Afterwards… been quite a few that went past my comfort zone/ ick factor.
That said, I really liked the movie and had “Kyle’s Mom Is A Bitch” for my cellphone ringtone for a year or so.
As an atheist, I agree with Chas Bufe’s Alcoholics Anonymous: Cult or Cure? that 12-step groups are inherently religious organizations whose primary goal is not to get people to stop abusing substances — if that were true, they wouldn’t have a bug up their ass about other groups, like Rational Recovery or Secular Sobriety — but to “spread their message.”
If 12-step groups work for you personally, fine. But IMHO courts and employers should not be embracing AA and other groups whose success rate tops out at 5% (no better than going it alone). If it weren’t for the religious — oh, excuse me, “spiritual” — content (”the higher power can be your doorknob”? snort), I doubt this would have happened.
Like Pablo in 14, I was surprised and thrilled to see Ayn Rand get massively dissed at the end of one episode.
The inability to mock libertarian ideals may be a strangely natural fit with South Park’s general attitude of assholish irreverence. If I had to pick out a political ideology for nihilistic assholes, it might very well be that very strain of “I’ve got mine, fuck you” libertarianism. Such people, if very clever, can be quite entertaining for half an hour with commercial breaks, but they’re not the kinds of people I’d like to live with.
My guess is that Ayn Rand was just too pretentious for them.
Regarding sacred cows, Penn Jillette referred to this as a “gris-gris” on “Bullshit!” and announced their mission on the show was to get rid of each and every one. Unspoken: except for his own, of course. That’s why you’ll never see a “Libertarianism” episode of “Bullshit!”, despite the high degree of relevance.
I can’t stand Bullshit. My roommates love it, and the generally more reasonable one actually made me watch a few episodes to “persuade” me on some topic or another, but Penn’s self-righteousness combined with the skillion ways they can stack the deck in each episode to make themselves look good is a major turn-off. If you want to just make fun of people you think are wrong or crazy, fine, but don’t act like your some kind of renegade hero for doing so, especially when you’re picking mostly easy targets.
but Penn’s self-righteousness combined with the skillion ways they can stack the deck in each episode to make themselves look good is a major turn-off.
This is where the problem lies in “Bullshit-” that the premise is, itself, bullshit.
Jillette is a resident fellow at the Cato Institute, the anti-government libertarian economic think tank. Just so we’re clear on what that means- Jillette is, in fact, PAID by this organization to promote their ideas that smoking doesn’t cause cancel, global warming is a myth, and so on.
NiP, I attended a few AA meetings about 17 years ago in Baltimore- for me it wasn’t the religious aspects that concerned me (even though I was and am an atheist), so much as it did seem that the people had swapped their addiction to alcohol for an addiction to the MEETINGS. It kinda freaked me out, frankly.
That concern was enough for me to stop attending and find my own way to sobriety. Took awhile, but I finally did.
Just so I’m clear on this…
South Park is a CARTOON, right?
Get over it. It is not relevant to anything except Matt and Trey making money.
Good for them.
Those of you interested in the details of AA and who have hours and hours of free time should check out David Foster Wallace’s novel Infinite Jest which not only gives a really extended meditation on what AA is really all about but also manages to be hysterically funny, lyrically sad and tendentious, often all on the same page. It’s also large enough to be used as a flotation device in the unlikely event of a water landing.
Louise, yeah, that’s another issue, the exchange of one “crutch” for another. The idea that one has to keep attending meetings for one’s entire life because one is never cured not only dovetails with the idea that “sinners” must never quit church, but is also sort of creepy and cultlike. (And, back in the day when smoking was ubiquitous, a lot of AA attendees picked up that habit at meetings, too.)
Glad to hear you’re sober and, judging by other comments I’ve seen of yours, reasonably happy in life.
“South Park is a CARTOON, right?”
…and so is Doonesbury and Tom Tomorrow (although neither is animated). So is every editorial cartoon ever created. Would you say that none of them is promoting a political agenda?
“Get over it. It is not relevant to anything except Matt and Trey making money.”
South Park is just as legitimate a target for analysis, observation, and mockery as any other political media product, and maybe more legitimate than most.
Get over it…
Amanda misses the point. The reason the show IS so good (when it is) is because the guys are libertarians and, therefore, not constrained by either conservative or liberal sacred cows.
If you get a chance to see Penn and Teller live, they’re great. You can even bring your kids.
If what you want to see a libertarian program which caters to your point of view, sure, it is a good show. But that’s what it is, sometimes– no different than a preachy liberal or conservative cartoon that caters to their own points of view. The difference is that the latter shows are honest about what they’re about, whereas South Park ostensibly claims to be iconoclastic.You shouldn’t drink the kool-aid and believe that libertarianism is some kind of anti-political stance that believes in skewering sacred cows. It is a political stance of its own whose adherents are just as defensive and preachy as doctrinaire liberals and conservatives can be. What Amanda is saying is that despite the fact that the show can be good, even Parker and Stone aren’t able to resist the temptation to make the show about their own personal/political beliefs even when they criticize others for doing so in their own show. I suppose they are only human, and this should be expected, but Amanda’s acknowledgment of this is a lot more clear-eyed and honest than those who believe that the show is “equal opportunity” skewering.
Actually, MikeEss, I see both your and Snookie’s points on this. South Park IS “just a cartoon” but at the same time, serves as social commentary.
I remember years ago reading where Stephen King got into a bit of a pissing match with someone (perhaps a professor of his), because the prof insisted that there was “deep meaning” in a book, while King took the position that (and I agree with this)- sometimes a book is just a book.
Matt and Trey have themselves expressed surprise that SP has been the moneymaker it is and has had such longevity. They didn’t expect more than one season.
Sometimes the shows are cool and make me think; other times (and certainly more so in the past few years, as the guys seem more full of themselves instead of just having fun with the characters as they initially did), it’s as if they are trying WAY too hard…
regarding Bullshit, I enjoy the show as it talks about issues in a way I’m not used to seeing on TV. Sure the deck is stacked in their favor and some of the episodes have massive holes in them but I use the good ones as a starting point for further research. Things such as the effects of the ADA, their episode on the boy scouts on bottled water were also good I though. Also theyve hinted or said that the final episode of the show will be bullshit is bullshit. Finally at the very least I understand gillettes motivation for doing the show, cato associations aside. Reminds me a lot of houdini and his thoughts on charlatans.
Sorry Mike, it’s just a cartoon. And yup, so is Doonesbury.
There is a whole lot of reality out there we could be discussing.
Opinion, satire, et al are merely spices, not the main course.
Sadly, we have blurred the line between fact and opinion in this country to such an extent that both are reported as actual events.
I want to see an episode where Kyle and Cartman take an AV course and start making atrociously bad-looking cartoons where they make fun of all the teachers in the school (and reveal secrets in the process) and a geek decides to “analyze” their work and pronounces it full of insights and a movement forms at the school making Stan and Cartman local heroes for having the “balls” to say what everyone else has been thinking. It goes to Cartman’s head and he begins lording his “deeply perceptive” insights over the rest of the school. Eventually Kyle gets sick of it all and announces to everyone that there is no point to the cartoons, they were just making fart jokes all along, and everyone should go back to their own lives so Cartman can stop making an ass of himself every five minutes.
In other words, “Why are you concentrating on X when Y is so much more important?”.
Who the fuck is reporting South Park as fact?
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40,946 hits in Google News under the search “South Park”
Oh, you mean other than them?
Smartass; just because it’s “written in writing” doesn’t make it REAL!!!
Phhhhht!!!
The Scientology episode alone makes up for the libertarian bullshit. That. Was. Awesome.
(and the underpants gnomes)
I’m going to derail slightly and I apologize, but this is something that pops up now and again on the ol’ interwebs and it drives me nucking futs.
The whole “fiction means nothing and should never be discussed” argument is something I never ever want to hear again.
Why ? Because it’s a bullshit argument. We’re human beings. Our culture is based in information-sharing and language, and a huge chunk of that is storytelling. From the most basic myths that helped our ancestors (and us, in large part) deal with their identity and place in the universe; to the epic poems and ballads that recorded our interpretations of our own cultural histories; to the science fiction and futurist stories that predicted and inspired some of the biggest technological changes in our modern society; to the common dramas on every television set that reflect our desires and our struggles and the experiences of others; fiction is an expression of the human experience and is incredibly, deeply valid.
As such a vital part of our social structure, is it valid to dissect it, discuss it, see it in the context of the creators’ or writers’ beliefs, argue over it, try to better understand it, whatever ? Yes. Yes, absolutely.
Even cartoons ? Hell yes. Cartoons follow us our whole lives from childhood to adulthood- they’re accessible and widespread and therefore a common way to carry meanings, morals and all kinds of subtext-y baggage. They’re well worth an exploration in theme and meaning.
That went on longer that it should have… sorry, but I just can’t stand that argument. Anyway, my two cents on South Park- it’s funny and very bright and often hits on fantastic social satire, but they shouldn’t dish it out if they can’t take it- some of their apparently deeply-held libertarian beliefs are pretty damn boneheaded, but they seem to feel those particular ideas are untouchable. Hmm.
See, I thought that was their funniest episode, ever. The addition of Thom Yorke’s concern about “butt cancer” was just icing.
“The reason the show IS so good (when it is) is because the guys are libertarians and, therefore, not constrained by either conservative or liberal sacred cows.”
That’s the equivalent of saying that if I was Muslim it I wouldn’t be constrained in attacking either Christian or Jewish sacred cows. Would that mean that Islam could not be mocked?
Being “libertarian” (and honestly, Ted Kaczynski is probably the closest to what a real libertarian would actually be like in real life) does not make you “neutral”, which you are implying, nor does it put you beyond the reach of mockery.
(Of course, ironically, the idea behind the phrase ’sacred cows’ comes from Hindu belief, so by even using that phrase somebody else’s tradition is mocked…)
No, you miss Amanda’s point. They’re constrained by libertarian sacred cows.
The one that sent me into a rage, though, was the episode in which it was decided that Trans-people are just delusional, mutilated freaks.
You can be an equal opportunity offender, but you do not pick on an underclass already targeted by those in power, especially if you then go on to “skewer” them by just repeating bigoted talking points.
Just so I’m clear on this…
South Park is a CARTOON, right?
Get over it. It is not relevant to anything except Matt and Trey making money.
Good for them.
I never find an end of laughing at people who think they’re so smart when they say things like this. It’s not just the lack of self-awareness. It’s like the double foldover lack of self-awareness, wherein their self-perception (I’m so awesome and smart and too cool for school) is inversely proportional to the way everyone else perceives them.
About the whole “no sacred cows” thing, I think their biggest sacred cow is that the kids are alright. They never get anything wrong, their view of the world is inherently sound, it is only the adults who are screwing things up. This makes all episodes hopeful and not particularly subversive.
Contrast this with a show like Beavis and Butthead, which was much better at scoial satire and a whole lot darker.
Raging
Well yes, but who (except for maybe you, me and Amanda) worry about that.
My point, of course, is that by being, like me, so far outside the mainstream, they can attack things others can’t and see humor where others can’t.
For the same reason, I can both enjoy (1) HC and BO attacking each other (often in the same underhanded ways they usually attack Repub’s) and (2) McCain being frustrated by his own public financing laws (which he so richly desrves).
Good gracious, other orange; who pissed in your cornflakes today? Do you NEED to find deep meaning in everything?
I’m reminded of Rodney Dangerfield’s “Back to School”, where Thornton Melon has hired Kurt Vonnegut Jr to write an essay on… himself!
I don’t know, I tend to find South Park painfully unfunny.
I’ve never really enjoyed it, it’s not my kind of humor, but I didn’t consider it offensive on any particular level. And then I saw an episode in which terrorists had stuffed a bomb up Clinton’s vagina, and decided that this was one of the shows I just shouldn’t watch because I do not enjoy being pissed off at the TV any more than I absolutely have to.
Which is a shame, really, because my boyfriend enjoys it (though he did change the channel in disgust last week when they aired the Britney Spears shoots her head off episode) and it’s on as background noise a lot.
You are of course right Amanda.
How could I have overlooked the deep meaningful social comentary of Yogi Bear and the Flintstones.
Without the social guidance of Woody Woodpecker (and of course the sad depiction of anti ghost discrimiation so poignantly illustrated by poor Casper) I am sure that the Civil Rights movement of the 1960’s would have gone off the rails.
Yup. I was wrong.
I haven’t watched South Park since the first season, so I’m not qualified to comment on its politics, but regarding the crack at Ayn Rand/Atlas Shrugged at the end of ‘Chickenlover’? While there’s some overlap, Randian Objectivism isn’t synonymous with libertarianism; it’s a creepy cult of personality that believes itself in possession of absolute truth as revealed by the writings of Rand (A=A and all). Most libertarians think that devout Objectivists are kind of nuts.
Point being, the Atlas Shrugged joke doesn’t show that Stone and Parker are willing to skewer their own sacred cows, because Rand’s not necessarily one of them.
Though I do agree with whoever it was upthread: when I did watch South Park, I always thought the preachy moralizing at the end of the show was a satirical riff on the self-righteous ‘every episode must have a moral’ sitcom trope - for example, in the ‘Spirit of Christmas’ bit where the kids discover that the true meaning of Christmas is ‘presents’
Snooks, I’m normally not very interested in spending my time looking for “deeper meaning” in various pop culture pablum. However, when a cartoon ends with the message AND THIS IS THE MEANING OF THE EPISODE, then, yes, I think it is valid to take the cartoon at its word. If that’s not your thing, then this is really not the thread for you.
louise,
As to your kind inquiry about who “pissed in my cornflakes” this morning, it was Snookie Oookums, who thought they could end the discussion by commenting that “…South Park is a CARTOON, right? Get over it. It is not relevant to anything…”
I don’t think you need to find meaning in everything. Far from it: sometimes a potato is just a potato, or whatever. But conversely I will argue to my last breath against the people who find meaning in nothing.
Just a misunderstanding.
“How could I have overlooked the deep meaningful social comentary of Yogi Bear and the Flintstones.”
…you fogot Scoobydoo!
Look Snookie, you know as well as I do that you can’t accurately compare Yogi Bear to South Park, The Simpsons, Futurama, etc.
Yes, indeed, there IS a whole lot of animated crap, with no more meaning than to get kids to watch commercials and ask their parents for stuff. This is no different than the nearly endless parade of bad sitcoms that somehow find their way onto the nation’s airwaves.
But it would be pretty stupid to assume that just because Gilligan’s Island was on TV, that meant The Wire is JUST mindless entertainment and nothing else…
I haven’t watched the show that much, but the fact that they act like that really doesn’t surprise me. That’s one reason I’ve never gotten into it. Sometime’s it’s hilarious and even insightful (I enjoyed the Wal-Mart episode, Tom Cruise in the closet) but I feel like a good 50% of the humor is just juvenile. The first 15 minutes of the “Cartman gets Scott Tenorman to eat his parents” episode is like one long pubic hair joke. And I feel like they aren’t actually as iconoclastic as they are given credit for. Like mothworm pointed out, they don’t bring in trans issue to mock trans-phobia. They just make really crass, stupid trans-phobic jokes. There was an episode making fun of an ex-gay camp for kids but it’s pretty clear the people being mocked are the fundies who are trying to “save” the children. So they are kind of comfortable with seeing gay people as human, but transpeople are still freaks. That doesn’t seem iconoclastic. That seems like the place where most moderate Americans are already.
I am not really trying to be a troll here folks…
Just a quick poll -
Can anyone name any major group that South Park has spared from ridicule?
I think you will see that they (quite correctly) realized early on that controversy for its own sake sells well.
The only reason for any broadcast media is to sell more soap. (and that sadly includes NPR who try to hide their ads by calling them ‘underwriting’)
Can anyone name any major group that South Park has spared from ridicule?
Looks like someone hasn’t been reading the thread very carefully. This entire discussion is pointing out that SP’s “we make fun of everyone” claim is just an empty trope.
Even “Libertarian” on this thread essentially agrees, saying that the reason he likes SP is that the beliefs of the creators allow them to ridicule those groups and beliefs that he disagrees with.
I like South Park because I agree with everything they say.
I said ‘major’ group…not libertarians (joke folks)
OR, ‘our’ side seriously DESERVES some lampooning.
Or, as a block, is simply wrong.
ALbinos.
South Park has not yet mocked albinos.
My albino husband is still waiting for this…
Yeah, cuz only media anointed by YOU is relevant.
“Dylan, he’s a singer, right? Get over him. His songs aren’t relative to anything except his ego.”
Okay, more seriously:
To the best of my knowledge they have not mocked George Bush or Dick Cheney. Given that they did an episode where Bill Clinton nearly let the Japanese take over America because they flattered his penis, this is a gigantic oversight.
I am aware that Trey and Matt were behind “That’s My Bush!”, but after 9/11, the show was canceled, and I don’t think Trey and Matt have done anything to specifically mock Bush (and possibly not even Cheney) since then. Were they pressured out of it after 9/11? Are they afraid of pissing off their “South Park Republican” audience? Or did they drink the Kool-Aid after 9/11 and now they really do think Bush is above being mocked?
I do understand how they can’t make fun of the Iraq War; since they already established that in their universe, Saddam Hussein was killed by Canadian farts and ended up becoming the lover of the Devil, it’d be very difficult to do a story about the Iraq War, since it couldn’t have happened in the SP universe. But Bush is mockworthy for many other reasons. Where is the story about Dick Cheney coming to South Park to hunt and accidentally shooting Kenny in the face? Where is the story about a talking killer ninja pretzel dedicated to killing the president and Kyle or Cartman or Butters are the only ones who can hear the pretzel? If they can do a story about a bomb in Hillary Clinton’s crotch, why can’t they do a story where Laura Bush keeps running over and killing people?
It’s not that they can’t mock Republicans. In the Terri Schiavo episode where Heaven needs Kenny to die and Cartman is trying to take him off life support for all the wrong reasons, the Devil suggests that they work through the Republicans to make sure that Kenny is kept alive, and he says “…like we always do” or something like that. I think Karl Rove might have been in that episode, too. But an inability to mock the President of the United States, when they’ve mocked both the previous President and his First-Lady-now-Senator-also-Prez.-Candidate, is a glaring oversight.
Am I wrong? *Has* South Park, specifically, ever mocked Bush?
You know, I blame people like you for the spate of fake memoirs that have been coming out lately. Because, as far as you’re concerned, if it didn’t actually happen, it’s worthless and you don’t want to hear about it.
Margaret Jones originally shopped Love and Consequences as a novel, but no one would buy it, because people don’t seem to be interested in a story unless it “really happened.”
And I wouldn’t discount Casper cartoons if I were you. A lot of them are pretty effed up, like when Casper befriends a fox who ends up being killed by hunters … and then returns as a ghost fox! Yay!
Back away from South Park and deriding it, Snookie Ookums… apparently the topic is plutonium and utterly crucial to the very fabric of society!
Huh??
I like South Park myself on occasion as mindless entertainment, but more and more I’m leaning towards “it’s just a TV show” side… next there will be something about how reality TV is “important”.
Gah. I’m old.
Okay, more seriously:
To the best of my knowledge they have not mocked George Bush or Dick Cheney. Given that they did an episode where Bill Clinton nearly let the Japanese take over America because they flattered his penis, this is a gigantic oversight.
I am aware that Trey and Matt were behind “That’s My Bush!”, but after 9/11, the show was canceled, and I don’t think Trey and Matt have done anything to specifically mock Bush (and possibly not even Cheney) since then. Were they pressured out of it after 9/11? Are they afraid of pissing off their “South Park Republican” audience? Or did they drink the Kool-Aid after 9/11 and now they really do think Bush is above being mocked?
I do understand how they can’t make fun of the Iraq War; since they already established that in their universe, Saddam Hussein was killed by Canadian farts and ended up becoming the lover of the Devil, it’d be very difficult to do a story about the Iraq War, since it couldn’t have happened in the SP universe. But Bush is mockworthy for many other reasons. Where is the story about Dick Cheney coming to South Park to hunt and accidentally shooting Kenny in the face? Where is the story about a talking killer ninja pretzel dedicated to killing the president and Kyle or Cartman or Butters are the only ones who can hear the pretzel? If they can do a story about a bomb in Hillary Clinton’s crotch, why can’t they do a story where Laura Bush keeps running over and killing people?
It’s not that they can’t mock Republicans. In the Terri Schiavo episode where Heaven needs Kenny to die and Cartman is trying to take him off life support for all the wrong reasons, the Devil suggests that they work through the Republicans to make sure that Kenny is kept alive, and he says “…like we always do” or something like that. I think Karl Rove might have been in that episode, too. But an inability to mock the President of the United States, when they’ve mocked both the previous President and his First-Lady-now-Senator-also-Prez.-Candidate, is a glaring oversight.
Am I wrong? *Has* South Park, specifically, ever mocked Bush?
(this may be a double post: I have seen three new posts appear since sending this, so I think I may have just lost the post rather than being in mod queue, but if I’m wrong I apologize)
Well, louise, if you don’t understand how important it was that Christian Siriano won “Project Runway” this season, I just don’t know what to say.
;-)
I will say this: never try to tell someone with a degree in film criticism that mass culture isn’t important. It says way more about us than we’d like to admit.
Not to mention, of course, that the problem with the “it’s just a TV show” argument is that a cultural artifact’s relevance can change over time. To many Londoners of the Elizabethan era, most of Shakespeare’s work would be “just a play”. But try telling that to the grad student doing a thesis on Love’s Labors Lost.
Authors, by and large, can be considered the authority on their works intent but are rarely very good at grasping its meaning. People are often blind to the significance of their own creations.
Those of you interested in the details of AA and who have hours and hours of free time should check out David Foster Wallace’s novel Infinite Jest which not only gives a really extended meditation on what AA is really all about but also manages to be hysterically funny, lyrically sad and tendentious, often all on the same page. It’s also large enough to be used as a flotation device in the unlikely event of a water landing.
Jesus Christ - how can you do that to unsuspecting readers?
People, we’re talking footnotes. We’re talking footnotes to footnotes. We’re talking about 12 page footnotes. In a novel.
You can be an equal opportunity offender, but you do not pick on an underclass already targeted by those in power, especially if you then go on to “skewer” them by just repeating bigoted talking points.
Congratulations, mothworm - I believe S&P’s reaction would be to ask who died and made you Grand High Dictator of What People Can And Can’t Do. Besides, those in power don’t give a shit about the transgendered (or gays, or immigrants, or…); social issues like that are just bread and circuses to keep the dupes on the Right occupied.
Alara -
I’ll concede the Albino thing…
But wasn’t the bunny who became Pope white haired with cute pink eyes?
(not meant as albino bashing - merely descriptive)
A close friend dated an albino guy in college, and has remained friends with him over the years… consequently, she is one of the few people I’ve ever met with a treasure trove of albino jokes ! (Mostly, he made them up.)
“next there will be something about how reality TV is “important”.”
Given how heavily edited and carefully selected what makes it into the episode is, reality tv is hardly free of narrative, theme, etc. And given how strong the public’s reaction has been to some of them, it would be hard to say that nothing could be learned from what chords are being struck or what chords the studios are hoping to strike by including certain scenes or conditions.
So it would seem, Mnenosyne!!
Oh, what WOULD Brian Boitano do?
This thread has reminded me of the Monty Python sketch with the pepperpots squabbling about whether something was satire or madcap humor…
This show is crap, from day one. The humor and animation is 2nd grade level at best. Geez - overgrown adolescence is friggin pandemic in this country - South Park is exhibit no. 1.
I didn’t see that as the point at all. Not everyone who drinks is an alcoholic. Certainly not Randy Marsh. And substuting addiction to the 12 steps for addiction to alcohol can be just as destructive.
Or is this just another bullshit AA “Everyone’s an alcoholic, they just haven’t admitted it yet” line?
South Park wasn’t all that funny when all it had was “being edgy and offensive”. It’s even less funny now that it’s “Stone and Parker’s Big Everything We Don’t Believe Bashfest”.
About the only good recent episodes were “Trapped in the Closet” and “Super Adventure Club”. Everything else has been nothing more than thirty minutes of tearing down anyone who isn’t them.
Yes, except that you’re not as likely to be violent, out of control, kill yourself or others through drunk driving, damage your health, etc.
Not all addictions are equally destructive.
Also, a second on Infinite Jest. It’s great, though I’ve been praying for the last month or so that it eventually will come to an end. It just keeps. on. going.
The above comment was me, btw, I put down “male authority figure” once for a joke and kind of forgot. Oops.
Also, I wanted to mention that I think reality TV is absolutely ripe for analysis. Frankly, anything that a lot of people spend a lot of time watching does have a large impact on our culture, larger, most likely, than stuff (like The Wire) that seems “deeper”.
I don’t typically do much analysis of reality TV, b/c I don’t really watch/enjoy it, but dismissing it out of hand is short-sighted.
“The trouble with them is they worship sacred cows.”
Juxtaposition with:They start making some bumpr sticker level Libertarian comment and I shut it off.
Time for me to finish a biography of Feynman.Oh,and “Some of my best friends were Liberal Arte majors.”
Damn, late again!
For anyone who’s read this far, here’s a link to the Onion’s interview with them a couple of weeks ago. It’s been many years since I’ve watched the show regularly, because they kept wallowing in their own ignorance when it came to politics (”Rosie O’Donnell is fat! And loud! And annoying! Hahahahaha!”). However, I thought this quote from the interview gave some insight on why they’re not interested in losing their ignorance:
To them, it’s all about their gut reaction and they’re never interested in asking why they have that reaction, which is why they do stupid things like swallow the Sore/Loserman bullshit during the 2000 recount hook, line and sinker.
As far as cultural commentary goes, they’re pretty good. I get the impression that they actually have a fondness for some of the topics they lampoon (e.g., Lord Of The Rings and Guitar Hero), which is probably why those episodes resonate better.
As far as convincing South Park Republicans to stop voting Republican, I’d imagine that the easiest thing to do would be to use a word who’s negative connotation has been revived by South Park itself and tell them that voting Republican is gay.