South Park is ruining the world

   I think that comedy can be a really good vessel for engaging with politics however I do not believe that South Park should ever be shown to children and I don't think there are any lessons that should be learned from the show. I think the animation really dehumanizes people and the humor is less satire and more using political issues as comedy. I think it can be really important to laugh at the problems of the world however, South Park simply brings up hot button political issues and makes fun of everything and everyone involved. This teaches the children watching this that these important political discussion are just jokes and it desensitizes them to engaging in serious dialogues. South Park teaches a "fuck it who cares" attitude that I think can actually be a really dangerous way of seeing the world.
  Mixing politics and fart jokes conflates these things in our mind, making them both topics we can laugh off and forget about after 20 minutes.

Comments

  1. UnknownOctober 28, 2018 at 8:37 PM

    Interesting point. I agree with you in terms of the South Park episode we watched in class, but not necessarily for all of them. I think the strength in South Park is how current it is. An episode is made in a week, allowing it to come out with content relevant to the most current news cycle. I think South Park allows some viewers the outlet to see on the screen the most exaggerated version of how they may be feeling. Take for example the Margaritaville episode about the stock market crash. The way they showed bankers and the government being irresponsible and idiotic in terms of handling finance. As exaggerated and hyperbolic it may get, it spoke to how many Americans were feeling after loosing so much. It tackles how people in economics use jargon to confuse average Americans and distance us from understanding the economy. And how those who do "know" the economy are acting irresponsibly (i.e. making bailout decisions by cutting off the heads of chickens and seeing where they land) and in the end really know nothing at all. Cynical? Yes. But sometimes it says exactly how I feel.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TGwZVGKG30s

    ReplyDelete
  2. UnknownOctober 28, 2018 at 8:40 PM

    I'm not really sure South Park is meant for kids, which was kind of the point of watching it. The episode that we watched specifically was created to comment on America's point of view on the middle east such as mixing up Iran and Iraq as if they're the same country. It's obviously a different approach on commentary, but it's definitely light hearted and if anything has a more social and political commentary than not. I also don't think anyone is watching South Park as a source of new either.

    ReplyDelete
  3. UnknownOctober 30, 2018 at 8:40 AM

    I sort of agree with you. I do think that South Park humor is a little bit excessive and inappropriate, but I think that's what they were going for. They tried getting so close to crossing the line of "okay that's just wrong," that it made people feel uncomfortable, and I think for many people that was the close.
    I see where you're going when you're saying that South Park is terrible because it's a bad influence to kids, but then that brings up the question, aren't all satires bad influences. Because all satires are "joking" about something that is serious going on in this world. I think in that case maybe it's okay, or maybe it depends on whether you cross that line or not. I'm not really sure now.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Bratz: Rock Angelz is the movie I didn't know I needed

Image
This weekend, I watched the hit 2005 animated movie Bratz: Rock Angelz. This movie was one of the first Bratz films in CGI, and let me tell you- the plot is ALL OVER THE PLACE. The girls start a fashion magazine and use stolen passes to get into hot London punk clubs, but when they lose their passes they decide that the only way to get into the gig is to become a rock band? This movie can be considered capitalist propaganda- the Bratz shop in order to destress about their problems, and it's an implemental part of their lives. They don't have jobs either- Jade has an internship, but only for three hours until she is fired. Chloe meets a TRASH British prince and ignores her best friend Yasmin who finds celebrity judge Byron Powell's (I don't make this stuff up) dog, Ozzy. Jade and Sasha try to do a photo shoot for the magazine, but Sasha micromanages the whole thing and makes her friend feel bad! And this whole time, there's these two evil blond twins (Kaley Cuoco PLA
Read more

Does Animation Have to Make You Laugh?

Something that I have taken note of lately is how you barely ever find any mainstream animation that doesn't have some semblance of comedy integrated into it. For example, when was the last time you saw a Disney movie that didn't make you laugh (or at least try to)? And when was the last time you saw an adult cartoon that wasn't making a joke every 10 seconds. My point is, mainstream animation has seemed to simplify itself into a single tone: Comedic. Even in the films that are primarily covering serious topics there is typically a comic relief character to add some lighthearted fun to the film. But do all films need this? Is it necessary for all animation to try and entertain us in the exact same way? My answer is no and I wish that more animation studios and their production companies would realize this. One thing I don't think many people realize is that animation can be lighthearted without being funny. When I say you don't have to be funny all the time, that
Read more

She-ra is my new favorite gay icon

She-ra is a Netflix original spinoff of the he-man franchise. I was never a fan of the original show, but I thought I'd check she-ra out and I'm glad I did. It's a fun show, and I wish we had more like it when we were kids. It's one of the few kids shows where women outnumber men in the lead cast, and there's so much gay but it's not like "woah look at all this gay!" It's a lot more subtle, and I think that's great. Of course, there are more seasons to come, but I'm glad that the first one showed as much restraint as it did. I feel like if we treat LGBT people as special, it'll only perpetuate the idea that they're something "other" than straight people. It's important that our pop culture reflects the idea that gay people are just, you know, people. Take all that with a grain of salt though, I'm a straight cis white guy. I just wanted to start a conversation.
Read more