South Park: America’s Mirror of Itself

I would have never thought I would have had to watch two South Park episodes for homework. I’ll tell you what, sure beats the hell out of a psychology paper or reading some boring chapter in some science textbook in my opinion.

Watching cartoons for homework in college? Say what?!?

What do you expect though? It’s South Park. One of the biggest animated shows pretty much exclusively for older people who have an actual understanding of the world or at least think so.

One thing I have to say about the show is that it is AWESOME. Now I may not watch every episode religiously, but if it happens to be on or one of my buddies just decides to pull an episode up on the screen, I’m watching! I remember the first time I had seen South Park as a small child in the late 1990s. I just thought it was a bunch of kids with bad mouths who always end up watching their friend, Kenny, die in every episode. It was not until I was in high school or so; that I realized that the actual show raises many issues going on depending on what big controversies are trending at the time of airing. The character in Brian Dunphy’s Satire Brew brings up many interesting points about the creators, Matt Stone and Trey Parker’s powerful use of animation and comedy to express and poke fun at the American culture. The character calls them “the most financially successful of the fifth estate” (Dunphy 137). The reason for Stone and Parker’s success is that not only do they bring together their audience through humor, but also they educate the public and potentially spark some thinking on certain topics. Another reason for the show’s success is that the creators never seem to be scared of bringing up issues that are sensitive like racism, left vs. right politics, religious tolerance etc.

The first episode that I randomly chose to watch was titled, “Cock Magic”., which aired last year during their 18^th season. In this episode, the main characters, Cartman, Kyle, Stan, and Kenny, end up getting involved in an illegal cock-fighting ring. This wasn’t any normal cock fighting that we expect here. Instead, we see two roosters fighting it out playing the trading card game, MAGIC the Gathering. What makes this hilarious is that this type of cock fighting was so serious to the authorities in the show. What made it even more hilarious was how Randy Marsh, Stan’s dad, starts his relive his college days by performing in magic shows doing tricks with his penis. To be honest, I have no clue what Matt and Trey are trying to say in this episode. Are they trying to say that kids and parents aren’t supporting their school’s athletic programs by having nobody attend the girls’ volleyball games? Well maybe. I mean considering, all of these “education budget cuts” that these states are doing, I wouldn’t be surprised if many schools around the country are neglecting extracurricular activities such as sports and arts. Another thing I was confused about was MAGIC? The card game? Really? Who even plays that game? According to the character in Satire’s Brew, “Matt and Trey are acting as the new type of teachers in today’s media world, using their satiric program to educate, inform, and entertain” (151). Here in this episode, I didn’t see much of any of those except for entertain. It’s probably because I don’t watch the news or pay attention to cock fighting busts going on around the country.

The second episode I ended up watching was “World War Zimmerman”. Now this episode was the complete opposite of the first I watched. Matt and Trey decided to pick on one of the most controversial topics of the year, the Treyvon Marin/George Zimmerman verdict in 2013. In this episode, Cartman is unable to sleep at night because of nightmares he keeps having that Token, an African American classmate wants to kill him because of the outrage of the jury’s decision on the George Zimmerman trial in World War Z style nightmares. (If you haven’t seen World War Z, then I’d highly recommend it.) In this episode, Matt and Trey did an excellent job of satire by making fun of America’s biggest problems going on at the time; George Zimmerman, racial prejudice, and dumb laws where people can kill who they want. Cartman, of course, ends up coming up with a “genius” plan to kill George Zimmerman by dressing up in black and putting black face on. What happens is that Cartman ends up being shot and the authorities find out that Zimmerman had shot a white kid. Zimmerman then ends up going to jail and was found guilty of murder leading to his execution. This was obviously a hard jab at our justice system by Matt and Trey. They play with many Americans’ belief that had a white kid been shot instead of Treyvon Martin, the case would have gone different. Going back to the South Park episode; Cartman manages to crash three planes and scaring the whole entire nation of an “outbreak” where zombies are attacking. After this, Cartman decides to shoot Token himself after learning about the “Stand your ground” laws. Cartman gets let free for this. (Obviously). I really like this episode and the overall meaning behind it. Unlike the last episode I watched, I could actually connect this to what the character from Satire’s Brew talks about.

“Matt and Trey have catalogued the American experience as they’ve emerged as the voice in the middle of a nation divided” (Dunphy 188).

Sources: Satire’s Brew: Mass Media & Coffee Beans by Brian Dunphy

http://southpark-zone.blogspot.com/2014/11/s18-cock-magic.html

http://southpark-zone.blogspot.com/2013/10/s17-world-war-zimmerman.html