My question to you guys here is :
Do you like watching South Park? If not, why?
I understand that the jokes in it can rub a lot of people the wrong way especially when they make fun of religious groups, race and current day first world problems.
Personally I’ve enjoyed the show ever since I watched earlier seasons on DVD years ago. I just find the humor and some of the moments give you that shock kind of laughter “They really put that in there??”
So what’s your view? Do you watch it? Do you hate it? You thought of watching it?
Let me know!
I used to like it a lot… As a kid… As I’ve grown it seems more focused on being incredibly in the middle than ever actually making any sort of point…
Matt Stone and Trey Parker are just so incredibly "Enlightened Centrist* that it can be painful at times.
They have some good bits and some of their jokes have rightfully stood the test of time… But God damn… If you’re going to make a political show… Do something other than the most fence sitting thing possible!
The “both sides are cartoonish idiots” take got a bit old once I was no longer an edgy middle schooler
I thought it was silly stupid fun when i was a teen
In my 20s i thought it was genius
In my 30s I think its “both sides are stupid” approach to everything is annoying and an immature stance in a world where one side is shit and one side is super mega ultra shit.
remind me in 7 years to tell you about totally different way i feel about it in my 40s.
Started strong, ending weak, like most things that stay on the air far beyond their Best By date.
Matt and Trey got old and turned into the same kind of curmudgeons they used to mock.
It happens to everyone, especially when they’ve had fame and money and stop being the punk rock weirdos in the biz. They aren’t the young upstarts pointing out the absurdity of the business anymore, they’re the financial lynchpin of Comedy Central. They’re as important to revenue as shit like the Daily Show. Whether they want to admit it to themselves or not, they’ve grown to become what they hated. As artists working for a big corporation, they represent The Industry.
They don’t think of themselves at the rich corporate tools, but they are whether they think they are or not. The run-ins they’ve had with the staff at Casa Bonita speak to it as well. They’re not actually listening to their workers. Further, no word on whether the people at Casa Bonita are allowed to unionize. Wouldn’t be surprised if Matt and Trey are outright against unionization. “Why would you want to unionize when we’re offering $30 an hour?” Because at some point you can just change your mind about it, like you’ve already changed your mind on your employees once already.
South Park’s real crime was to think they were being subversive and not understanding that Capital doesn’t give a fuck about morals or ethics or who gets made fun of, they only give a fuck about money. If being subversive and making fun of everyone makes money then they’ll back it to hell and back, social consequences be damned. They don’t care if your dumb show makes people think dumb shit, and you don’t get to absolve yourself for it by saying shit like “we think people shouldn’t get their politics from our cartoons.” Sorry, they do get their politics from your cartoon, dumbfucks. You don’t absolve yourself of it by handwaving it away like the people are the problem and not the product you’re creating.
They don’t get to hide from the endless stream of copycat “adult” cartoons that all try to out-offend each other. They’re all trash and none of them have ever equaled what South Park originally brought to the table.
EDIT: Also, they went from being the guys who put all the episodes of their show online, for free, on southpark dot com to the guys who made a deal with Paramount to lock everything behind a paywall. If you want to bitch about how the corporate suits are making PIRACY WORSE because they fail to see that access to their content is a SERVICE PROBLEM, then maybe you need to accept that Matt and Trey are some of those corporate suits.
https://www.wired.com/2008/03/south-park-to-o/
In an appropriately glib statement, Parker and Stone said they were inspired to start the site when they got “really sick of having to download our own show illegally all the time. So we gave ourselves a legal alternative.”
Interesting how times change and now they’re simply money grubbing assholes that don’t care about locking content behind paywalls? Fuck em. They’re fucking corporate suits like anyone else now. Matt and Trey together have a wealth of over a billion dollars combined, but they don’t have enough money to put the episodes online for free anymore apparently… Suits.
(You should change your title to be the question)
I personally love it. It’s not the cleanest of humor, but it’s just a pure satire of our society, and I love it. The show has changed as it’s aged, it goes up and down, but I love how they’re not afraid to call out bullshit we put up with. Season… 22 how every scene starting on the school had gunshots and children screaming? Hilarious to me, because it’s so ridiculous how we just put up with school shootings. It’s outrageous, and it’s meant to offend, and idk I just appreciate it.
When everyone else is trying to appease corporate committees and shareholders, Southpark just says fuck it and writes what they want.
When everyone else is trying to appease corporate committees and shareholders
Counterpoint: The money South Park makes by pissing people off directly impacts Comedy Centrals profits. It’s in Comedy Central’s best interest to have South Park be offensive, because attention and engagement is more important in the modern world than whether or not people actually like something. Capital doesn’t give a damn about how they appease corporate committees and shareholders, as long as money is being made: South Park makes money hand-over-fist being offensive. There’s literally been an unending stream of copycat “offensive adult animation” ever since South Park hit the air. They’re emphatically not sticking it to the man. They are the man.
South Park is almost 30 years old. They are the industry. They are still around because they make money. If they actually offended the sensibilities of corporate committees and shareholders, they wouldn’t still be on the fucking air. Both Matt and Trey individually have wealth valued at well over half a billion dollars. Add them both together and you have a billionaire. But sure, they’re still somehow “subversive” with money coming out their fucking ears.
