South Park: Classic or Dud?

Like, I definitely share your concerns in a general sense, frogs. I just don't think SP is to blame.

gotta love libertarians who think empirical science is "lol gay"

you don't think SP's massive success served as a model for anyone/anything?

xp

Sure. But to the extent that that's true, it's because a lot of people's brains are constantly sputtering and emitting showers of sparks.

if you believe people get their moral centers wholly from a single cartoon they watched as a kid then yeah knock yourself out blaming these guys

The one SP moment that actually stuck with me as somewhat profound was in the n-word episode when Stan finally conceded that he didn't understand Token's experience and never fully would. Pretty much everything else has been ignorable stupidity that occasionally makes me laugh.

maybe it was a little irresponsible of them to fan said sputtering showers of sparks with dynamite, imo

my position isn't as simple as "people get their moral centers wholly from a single cartoon", it's that they played a role in the broader culture which normalized and "made cool" a bunch of positions, modes of discourse, and imagery that were previously beyond the pale and relegated to the fringes.

xp

they are part of a cultural strain that equated being offensive with a mark of quality in and of itself - they weren't the first to do it by any means, but they definitely served as an amplifier for it as a raison d'etre

white guys enjoying the privilege of being transgressive, what could go wrong

i can't really speak to later years of south park as i checked out over a decade ago but while i enjoyed it when it was just an offensive dumb cartoon, and i was a teenager, increasingly south park became a very political show promoting, in almost every episode, an anti-pc libertarianism, and lib-baiting.

Parker & Stone are far from beyond criticism, but blaming a dumb cartoon for society's ills is kind of along the lines of Grisham blaming Natural Born Killers for his friend's murder.

xp. although we've gotten a bit past anti-pic libertarianism now with the alt-right (though libertarianism is a gateway drug to white supremacy and fascism generally)

if you believe people get their moral centers wholly from a single cartoon they watched as a kid then yeah knock yourself out blaming these guys

a lot of these people still watch it. it's been on for 20 years. I still catch like 3-4 episodes a year

and I dunno if "it's just a cartoon" really applies here since nearly every episode from S6 onward had a pretty overt message to it, usually something like "both sides are bad, so joke's on you if you care about anything lol"

for shame

but blaming a dumb cartoon for society's ills

how about just blaming them for making a shitty viewpoint popular

xxpost Yes, but again: the only reason a dumb message like that would have any sway is because the persuaded audience's critical thinking skills are excessively eroded. There are a whole host of underlying reasons why people wind up that way.

no one came out to vote for wildly unpopular presidential candidate Hilary Clinton because of of that episode where cartman pooped out of his mouth

it's cool that you guys keep trying to move the goalposts in order to slander my POV as something other than it is, I wonder if there's a term for that

how about just blaming them for making a shitty viewpoint popular

― Οὖτις, Tuesday, June 12, 2018 2:45 PM (one minute ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

That's a valid criticism.

FWIW I think the advent of reality television is the scourge of the earth and has furthered even shittier viewpoints/norms among the generation in question than SP has, but I'd still argue that it's because those people were failed before reality shows came along to normalize their own particular brand of shittiness.

if I wanted to similarly argue in bad faith I would sum up Whiney et al's position as "shows are not important and don't influence anything so joke's on you if you care about it"

which tbf is a very South Park-ian position

xp

the key element of SP is that it's not very challenging, the lead characters are stand-ins for the creators and for the audience and it's extremely libertarian in its assuredness of its own correctness and the softness and naiveté of everyone else.

There have been times where they evinced some self-crit but it's the exception.

I dunno, man, I'd just say: my worldview isn't influenced by this dumb cartoon, your worldview clearly isn't influenced by this dumb cartoon, and to the extent that others' worldviews are influenced by this dumb cartoon, it's worth considering what underlying factors are informing that difference (I'd argue that any parents letting their kids watch it are irresponsible as fuck if they aren't also providing some education in critical thinking to offset the dumb ideas).

there isn't any sole factor though as someone who worked on about 25-30 different reality TV shows i pretty much agree w/what you said above, which is one reason i quit (the other being the election tbqf.)

fuck this but old lunch otm

Think South Park warping the mind of teens might be an overplayed opinion, but for those who were always inclined to adopt its privileged libitarian politics it certainly reinforced their world view and coached them in what became the 4chan style of debate - the "u mad bro?" discourse where who cares loses. Don't think it's a simple case of changing minds, more that its general attitude is fucking everywhere now, and it is polluting debates with no end in sight.

I hate the morals at the end of the stories more than anything (the dicks / pussies / assholes speech in Team America worst of all) but they seem to have had less of an obvious influence.

no one came out to vote for wildly unpopular presidential candidate Hilary Clinton because of of that episode where cartman pooped out of his mouth

they did have a very popular episode that mocked people who cared enough to show up to the polls even though neither candidate was absolutely perfect

that episode certainly mocked the limp candidates we were given but i don't remember it mocking voters

yeah that episode also aired in October 2016. i guess they brainwashed people in the matter of a few weeks.

the idea that people are these empty vessels until they receive programming from media is absurd. it is one of the big modern myths. "if only people watched the right tv shows they would think right"... sure

keep fightin that strawman

you'll beat him one day

I'm talking about the P. Diddy "Vote or Die" one that I still hear getting quoted all the time

not saying that SP brainwashed people into being idiot libertarians but it certainly seemed to have a knack for validating shitty viewpoints

generally speaking, here's how things like South Park (or any number of other shitty cultural products like, say, Kanye records) influence the broader public discourse: 1) popular product espouses specious viewpoint, ostensibly for laffs and/or shock value, 2) other, lesser venues pick it up and run with it (internet memes, comedians, ripoffs, public figures looking to make hay out of it, commentators expressing shock/taking it seriously, etc.), 3) audience absorbs specious viewpoint as just being part of the discourse around particular issue, 4) stupider portions of audience take specious viewpoint seriously, 5) stupider portion of audience seeks out similar/related specious viewpoints, becomes even stupider.

if this all sounds craaaaaaaazy bear in mind our current President

OL is correct that there's lots of other things leading up to the endpoint in that scenario besides "shitty TV show says shitty thing" but it's all a rich tapestry, and I don't see any reason to give a free critical pass to a show that espouses shitty things. esp THIS show, who's whole reason for existence is, again, white guys getting off on consequence-free transgression.

and yet cartman being all “come at me bro” and sobbing when he’s weakly hit = still the best critique of how republicans operate in the public sphere that i’ve seen

feel like marketing and the idea of being on tv turning cartman into a heroic figure blunt a lot of the most interesting aspects of his character. it’s probably impossible to have any character on any marketed show have a more critical than heroic thrust tbh.

feel like the rise of the tv “antihero”* has also made a lot of shitty behavior by shitheads something to aspire to, even more so than in the scarface/godfather era

*lol male showrunners

But...validating how? And for whom? Is the complaint ultimately about SP's popularity? Y'all keep brushing right up against points I would agree with you on (has a knack for popularizing shitty viewpoints, yes) but not quite getting there.

At any rate, it's a show that I've enjoyed and laughed at and been pissed off at but that I ultimately won't defend too strongly because I do agree that a lot of the perspectives as presented are irresponsible/antisocial and I wouldn't recommend it to anyone. But although I recognize the knee-jerk desire to demonize creative endeavors I believe to be harmful, ultimately I have to acknowledge that they only have the power to harm people with insufficient critical defenses. That those people exist in ever-greater numbers seems undeniable and is greatly alarming, but the problem of people being swayed by the dumb ideas of a dumb cartoon is a problem that exists wholly independently of SP (or the thousands of other bad idea outlets).

(Also if you just want to argue that people as a species are generally incapable of reckoning responsibly with the fruits of their creative labor, I would totally sign off on that.)

xxxpost to frogs

Also if you just want to argue that people as a species are generally incapable of reckoning responsibly with the fruits of their creative labor, I would totally sign off on that.)

We've seen every episode of South Park ever since it started airing. The only people who would be that greatly affected by a cartoon with an inability to question the characters and writing already had pre-existing issues. I think about the Kyle's dad being a well known internet troll a lot.

Gah, I feel old now remembering when the xmas short came out and thinking it was amazing.

and yet cartman being all “come at me bro” and sobbing when he’s weakly hit = still the best critique of how republicans operate in the public sphere that i’ve seen

― maura, Wednesday, June 13, 2018 12:11 AM (four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Really? If that's the best critique of republicans operating in the public sphere, then good luck usa, because you are in dire need of a proper critique of said republicans in said public sphere. SP isn't anywhere near properly criticizing republicans. It's a republican show at heart.

We've seen every episode of South Park ever since it started airing. The only people who would be that greatly affected by a cartoon with an inability to question the characters and writing already had pre-existing issues. I think about the Kyle's dad being a well known internet troll a lot.

The only people who would be that greatly affected by a cartoon with an inability to question the characters and writing

once more for the cheap seats: no one is saying this

and yet cartman being all “come at me bro” and sobbing when he’s weakly hit = still the best critique of how republicans operate in the public sphere that i’ve seen

― maura, Wednesday, June 13, 2018 12:11 AM (four minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Really? If that's the best critique of republicans operating in the public sphere, then good luck usa, because you are in dire need of a proper critique of said republicans in said public sphere. SP isn't anywhere near properly criticizing republicans. It's a republican show at heart.

xpost But yeah, Old Lunch otm and yes to reality tv being way worse.

I'd probably be wise to save it for the controversial opinions thread if I were willing to expend much energy on the argument, but I feel like SP is one of the less ideologically-aligned popular enertainments out there inasmuch as it is willing to present differing viewpoints on a given topic (even if it is ultimately in the service of skewering one or all of the viewpoints presented). Like, whatever P&S's personal ideological slant may be, it's hard to argue that they're shoveling out propaganda for just their ideology.

(Unless you focus on their treatment of ecological issues, which seems to be invariably dunderheaded.)

South Park has been shoveling out alt-right propaganda for at least a decade now. C'mon man. xp

I just had to re-read this to figure out what point was really trying to be made and also now annoyed because I thought new episodes were out.

it is willing to present differing viewpoints on a given topic (even if it is ultimately in the service of skewering one or all of the viewpoints presented)

lol how is this different from when Fox News brings on a "liberal" commentator

kinda sad you've fallen for their "both sidesism" bullshit as some kind of objective presentation of opposing views, c'mon now

xp