Like Erik Kain, I haven’t yet seen the second part of South Park’s 200th episode, wherein they joke about depicting the Muslim mythological figure Mohammed but are, once again, thwarted by the cowardly hypocrites who run Comedy Central. (Unlike Erik, I actually have the episode saved on my DVR.)
His analysis is spot on:
Really what this bit of fear-inspired censorship does is put a lie to every other piece of mockery which Matt Stone and Trey Parker ever dished out. They never flinched from sticking it to members of just about every other religion. Catholics, Buddhists, Mormons, celebrities, Scientologists, whites, blacks, Mexicans, gays, politicians, celebrities, conservatives, liberals, Tom Cruise, and on down the list — South Park has crossed as many lines as it could, as if to say that so long as every line is crossed and nothing is sacred no harm is done except to our vanity.
The network routinely runs crude humor and, indeed, that’s a staple of South Park. There’s simply no rationale for allowing the mocking of Jesus or Joseph Smith but being squeamish about this particular religion. Unless, of course, it’s because radical Muslims like to murder people for making fun of their little prophet. (Speaking of which, you can see all the Danish Muslim Cartoons by clicking the link.)
See “Comedy Central Censored Mohammed ‘South Park’” for coverage of the April 2006 incident.
UPDATE: Andrew Sullivan points to this snippet from the 2001 “Super Friends” episode, back when making fun of Mohammed was okay because we didn’t know his followers would start killing people for doing so:
Here’s a suggestion for the free speech blogosphere. The Youtube above, showing the 2001 episode now also taken down from the South Park Studios site, may not last very long. Embed it in your blog this morning. We need to show real solidarity with Matt and Trey. God knows Comedy Central isn’t (with the grand exception of Jon Stewart, peace be upon him).
I’m not sure it’ll help much, frankly, but it’s interesting that Comedy Central is getting more squeamish over this issue.
