The Controversial Topic Of South Park

Numerous television shows satirize controversial topics in today’s society. Some of the topics include religion, celebrities, and current events. These topics can be found in the popular show South Park. South Park is a show that follows the life of four young boys: Kyle Broflovski, Stan Marsh, Eric Cartman, and Kenny McCormick. Kyle and Stan are good friends and are level headed characters that represent the creators, Matt Stone and Trey Parker. Eric is an obese, self-centered bigot. He often rivals with Kyle and devises plans to acquire money. Kenny comes from a poor family, which is often joked about in the show. He wears an orange hoodie that covers most of his face and muffles his voice. Kenny also used to be killed off quite often by

the creators but he has a special power that prevents him from dying. At the start of the show, the boys were in the third grade, but after a while they moved up to the fourth and have remained there ever since. The story takes place in a fictional town called South Park located in Colorado. Sometimes the boys adventures take them elsewhere, sometimes around the country others around the world. Recently the show’s creators have added side stories with some of the other characters like the boys’ parents, relatives, and other acquaintances. At the end of most episodes one of the characters mentions a theme that was learned due to the events that ensued over the episode.
Kyle is the lone Jew in the group of boys. Eric often torments him about it. One stereotype of Jews is that they all have money or gold. Those are some of the common targets Eric is after. In the episode “Two Days Before the Day After Tomorrow” Eric and Kyle are about to escape a dangerous situation. Eric won’t allow Kyle to leave without giving Eric his Jew gold. Kyle gives Eric a bag of gold, but he isn’t satisfied because all Jews have a fake one to protect their real one. This episode jokes about the stereotype and ridiculing the idiocy of it. In the episode “The Entity” Eric tries to refrain from joking about Kyle, but he eventually breaks and makes a joke about Jewish history. Matt and Trey can have a rough sense of humor, but they don’t target just one group, everyone has an equal opportunity to be ridiculed. Jesus Christ makes an appearance in several episodes. One episode “Damien” centers on a fight between Satan and Jesus. They also dedicated an entire episode to the study of Scientology. Within the episode they discuss the beliefs of Scientologists in a sarcastic manner. They also joke about their methods of recruiting new followers. Some followers of Scientology include popular celebrities, these celebrities were unable to escape mockery.
In the Scientology episode the creator’s also focus on the characters of Tom Cruise and John Travolta. They were mostly mocked for their beliefs in Scientology but other jokes were made about them. One of the common jokes made was telling Tom Cruise to come out of the closet. They expose the truth about the celebrities and ridicule their behaviors. One episode that supports this is “Fishsticks.” In the episode a joke becomes popular and is said about everyone but Kanye West doesn’t understand it. Kanye freaks out about it and after several explanations still doesn’t understand the joke. In the episode Matt and Trey portray Kanye’s ignorant and self-centered attitude. Another episode that ridicules celebrities is “It’s a Jersey Thing.” This episode focuses on the popular reality television shows, specifically The Real Housewives of Orange County and Jersey Shore. They mock the common life style shared by those people. At the beginning of the episode, the stereotype that people from New Jersey have a short temper is depicted. The short temper is shown by characters representing Teresa Guidice and her husband from The Real Housewives of New Jersey. Later on they focus on other stereotypes including spray tans, constant exercising, gold chains, and nicknames. In the episode the Jersey people are spreading their beliefs across the country and are approaching South Park. As they move west, people conform to their way of thinking and advance across the country with them. The townspeople of South Park find a hideous creature, which represents the Jersey shore celebrity Snooki, ransacking businesses. In Snooki they are showing how disgusting fake looks and greed are. Eventually the people of South Park have to call on help to stop the invasion. No one is willing to help until they finally reach out to Al-Qaeda who help. This is an extreme example but with this part they are showing that your enemy could end up being your greatest ally.
Osama Bin Laden leads his followers to fly planes into the crowds of Jersey people eventually pushing them back and saving the day.

South Park also satirizes current events. The part with Osama Bin Laden can be seen as mocking the tragic events on 9/11. With Matt and Trey’s history they are most likely targeting the terrorists and their methods of attacking us. At the end of the episode Osama Bin Laden is seen receiving an award for saving the country but then soldiers drop down and assassinate him. This could be seen as a method for showing that the creators do not support the terrorist activities and aren’t mocking the tragedy. Saddam Hussein also makes an appearance several times in the show, one of which in the episode “Ladder to Heaven.” He shows up toward the end of the episode. Saddam is seen producing weapons of mass destruction in heaven disguising it as a chocolate chip factory. God questions him about it but he lies to him saying he isn’t building weapons. Originally in South Park Saddam was sent to hell after he died but he was so evil he enjoyed it there. Satan and God made a deal to have him sent to heaven as a punishment. These show how evil Saddam Hussein is and illustrates that he won’t give up until revenge is acquired. South Park confronts the issue of the Japanese whaling industry in the episode “Whaling Whores.” At the beginning Stan is at the Denver aquarium with his family swimming with the bottle nosed dolphins. The Japanese suddenly show up harpooning the dolphins. It continues to show them attack other aquariums. This scene criticizes both sides. It ridicules the Japanese for their attacking of the marine mammals. The Japanese are put down because our American culture disapproves of the hunting of the animals. The other side criticizes the Americans for holding the marine mammals in captivity. It shows that Americans holding them in captivity can be as bad as the Japanese hunting them. After the attack, Stan wants to do something so he

joins the crew of Whale Wars. With the original captain they just yell and throw butter at the Japanese. The Japanese harpoon the captain, killing him. Stan shoots a flare at the ship destroying it, and the crew makes him their new captain. He continues the destructive spree, and the ratings for the show go up. Eric and Kenny want to be on TV, so they join the crew, although, they don’t care about the whales. This scene explains how the crew really doesn’t do anything, and that it’s just for publicity. Television has become staged, and the people don’t really fight for the cause but for the attention. Those people are represented by Eric and Kenny. It also demonstrates how the American public is attracted to violence. In the end, the boys are captured and the Japanese explain that the reason they’re hunting the whales is for revenge for the bombing of Hiroshima. The U.S. gave the Japanese a picture of a whale and dolphin flying Enola Gay. Stan tells them that the photo is a fake and gives them one of a chicken and cow flying Enola Gay. The Japanese start slaughtering chickens and cows. This part exaggerates the hate of the Japanese in wanting revenge until that species is extinct. It compares how our mass murdering and processing of chickens and cows is just as cruel as the Japanese attacking the marine mammals.
The creators of South Park blatantly admit what others won’t. They satirize several controversial topics, some of which are religion, celebrities, and current events. They will call out anyone on anything. Not just one group is targeted for the insults and criticizing, anyone and everyone has an equal opportunity to be offended. Matt and Trey don’t take sides on an issue, they criticize both sides whether it’s one person or an entire culture. There is an underlying message to every episode. Almost every episode can be broken down to see the truth about the topic. People are given a new way of thinking due to the show’s neutral attacks on issues.