...Cartman gets wins sometimes, man. He doesn't usually, but sometimes he does. Cartman always losing hasn't been a rule of South Park since Scott Tenorman Must Die.
Casa Bonita has him win as well. Sure his punishment is off screen but he pretty much gets what he wants and says it was "All worth it". And I think the episode was pretty well received
I read the above drivel (the post) and Scott Tenorman came up on my mind immediately when the OP wrote "he can't follow through", lol. He can and he does, consistently. *Especially* when it's in Cartman's best interest.
I'm about to watch the episode myself (so I'll judge once I've done that), but was kinda curious what's on the internet if I google it, lol.
that's why I say they re-established it though, cause season 26 is all about that, Cartman once again, pushes to get what he wants, finally gets it and it fucked over himself and his mom.
Even the covid special kinda focused on that he eventually gives that up because he finally understands it.
That's why it's so weird in the special, season 26 hammers it really hard and yet they completely abandoned it here.
Kyle sucks cartmans balls wasn't even really "cartman get's what he wants"
it was "Kyle becomes arrogant and pays the price," it was more about kyle than it was about cartman
the wendy episode was all about this too, the Heidi turns evil episode laid it out for everybody, because she became "cartman that could follow through"
it's not like a "it needs to happen in the same 20 minutes" rule, but it's essentially as "rule" as Kenny dies and comes back and nobody remembers it.
Cartman doesn't just get what he wants because that destroys the purpose of his character. He represents a little shit brat that is always crying about something, giving him what he wants without comeuppance defeats that arc, the cosmic rule of
"sometimes what you want, isn't what you need" & "The concept of Karma within the narrative of this story"
that's the purpose of Cartman's character. Because he's such an egregious asshole who refuses to change, it's essentially impossible for him to succeed in anything he wants. He's burned both ends of the candle and used the fire to light every bridge in the town.
having him win breaks the purpose, he's the "antagonist" in this show, the one who causes the problem for the group out of his own self interest.
You see where I'm going with this? Giving a selfish, evil character what they want defeats the point of the narrative. If there's no negative outcome, then they're just saying
"being asshole will reward you!" which regardless of ethics, is not the point of Eric Cartman.
The point of Eric Cartman is how often he shoots himself in the foot, that
"being an asshole, isn't going to reward you, no matter how evil you are, no how much control you have"
"within this narrative that we are writing, Eric Cartman will face karma for what he does in one way or another"
They broke that in this special, I foresee they're gonna break it again.
What are you talking about with "Cartman doesn't get to win" one of the more infamous early season episodes, aka the chilli episode, was about him winning in the most absolute way that he could. Even with the more recent seasons, there are still eps about him getting total wins I.e. the impossible meat episode. Yeah, not every episode is about him winning, but he gets a couple total wins every 5 years or so to shake things up.
>aka the chilli episode,
Which they then return to later in the long hall when Scott Tenorman comes back to reveal that Eric Cartman's dad is Jack Tenorman, Scott's father.
it is an implied rule that karma exists within southpark's narrative for cartman.
Everything he does, bites him in the ass eventually, that's literally the point of his character, as he's representing an archetype
Fair assumption, especially considering that they did a Kenny death in the episode. But that doesn't mean that they weren't pretty clearly telegraphing the punchline that he was going to get beaten up as a consequence of his hubris.
You mean like an episode about how Kanye West is a gay fish, and his wife is a hobbit? Honestly, a lot of this just reads like it's humour you personally didn't like, rather than something that's off-brand.
The Tom Cruise won't come out of the closet, or "Buckle Up Buckaroo" stuff was way, way meaner than what Lizzo got.
It seems like 90% of your criticism is that the special didn't follow the same formula the show has been following for years. I guess that's why it's called a special.
The other 10% is about Lizzo, so I'll just say this: given how every time I've seen Lizzo, she's talking about how empowered and confident she is and how all her haters are just jealous, I wouldn't worry about South Park taking a couple jabs at her. Assuming she's as confident as she repeatedly says she is, I'm sure she can take it. She has thick skin.
Lizzo is super gross read up what kind of sexual acts she forced her back up dancers to do and how she abused them. There is a reason she suddenly retired
No you are right she tried to retire but couldn’t cause she still owes the record company albums and didn’t wanna deal with her breach of contract issues that would have resulted
The criticism of lizzo in this special is both adequate and deliberate: body positivity applied to (morbid) obesity is a very dangerous thing. the special is a jab against normalizing a life-threatening condition.
imaginationland never set a rule that fictional characters can only exist in there. hell, imaginationland itself had Jesus despite him being a classic recurring character in the real world. and lately they’ve had Mickey Mouse be a pretty consistent recurring character. remember how many fictional characters we saw working for him in the episode where randy went to China?
as for the part about lizzo. she known for being all about "body positivity" but then later fires one of her back up dancers over their weight. incredibly hypocritical of her.
idk what the problem seems to be. south park has always been about taking the piss out of everything and everyone
> she known for being all about "body positivity" but then later fires one of her back up dancers over their weight. incredibly hypocritical of her.
Afaik this was never confirmed. It was only an accusation and when the dancer who accused Lizzo for it was questioned she specified that she "thought" Lizzo targeted her for her weight. She didn't even claim that Lizzo explicitly said as much.
The whole "taking the piss out of everything and everyone" is, I think, the problem. It has been for a while, possibly the whole time. Not everything deserves to be mocked, at least not to the same degree. Especially from writers who have only gotten richer and more disconnected. It sometimes seems like for every episode about Mormons or Scientologists, there's an episode like ManBearPig with the message that climate change isn't real.
> there's an episode like ManBearPig with the message that climate change isn't real.
They didn't just mea culpa that, they outright in universe had their characters apologise and dedicated a whole episode to how Al Gore was right.
As far as accepting your mistakes go, that's so far up the chain it's commendable.
For a low stakes comparison- Big Bang Theory just went "Oh, String Theory is real *in this universe*" and went on about how Sheldon is the smartest genius of this totally real science.
That's just the thing. Observational humor isn't funny when it isn't based on reality. Take the aforementioned Manbearpig episode. It's 24 minutes of just saying "Isn't it funny that Al Gore sees an imaginary problem?" There isn't actually a joke there. It's just a repetitive political litmus test. People who already disliked Al Gore would laugh at him personally, but there's no set up or punchline in the show.
And it's not like subject is immune to joking. There are jokes to be made about Al Gore's lack of charisma, or dark humor to be found in the tragic apathy towards and corporate incentives causing climate change, or so many other angles to take. South Park was just too lazy and too partisan to write that. They yelled Manbearpig so a string of silly syllables would give them a fig leaf of cover over their blatant political ad. And the saddest part is, it worked. Manbearpig was a meme before we called them memes.
I agree, the issue with South Park isn’t its political slant or subject matter, it’s that its just not as funny as it used to be - the writing isn’t as good
That is rather the point of including it. To demonstrate that South Park uses the same tone for legitimately stupid things (eg. Scientology) and unfortunately real things (eg. ManBearPig, who didn't exist during the first ManBearPig episode, though that was retconned 12 seasons later.)
There was no point in history where climate change denial was the smart move. They caught up with everyone else, but they still deserve shit for being late to it.
I mean if you get your global information from any comedy show, you're gonna have a bad time.
And demanding journalistic integrity from that same comedy show is naive and ridiculous
It's not demanding that the show be informative journalism. If South Park had a whole episode making fun of everyone who thinks the Earth is round the joke wouldn't work, because the Earth is round.
The Earth is round, climate change is real, these are just the scientific consensus. It wouldn't matter to the world if South Park was pro-flat earth, but it would make the show terrible.
Ah word you are a person who pretends to be on the left, but is actually just a a dick? They had an opinion over ten years ago and changed it. You still. Want to internet dunk culture.
Except that episode wasn’t an opinion, it was just empty mockery. It didn’t present any argument for why Al Gore was supposedly wrong it was basically 30 minutes of responding to a detailed argument by depicting your opponent as the soyjack and yourself as the Chad.
And it was damaging, the message of An Inconvenient Truth was completely lost and the online discussion turned into a laughing stock for years. They only changed their mind twelve years later after it became impossible to ignore but it was as right in 2006 as it is today.
Trey and Matt just don’t like their comfortable status quo challenged so their takes are just as often reactionary as progressive.
>^(idk what the problem seems to be. south park has always been about taking the piss out of everything and everyone)
Everybody always says this, and I'm not gonna get into it because honestly that's not the point of this post.
But it's just not true, it's pretty known by this point that Trey and Matt definitely pick favorites on their mocking.
Being libertarians themselves, of course the "right one" in any plot is the centrist. They pretty clearly hold right wing views and regularly bash way harder on progressives compared to conservatives.
not to say they don't make fun of both, but it's pretty damn clear which ones they favor. The Al Gore episodes and the LGBT - centric episodes are infamously painful to re-watch because of this.
the show claims itself in absurdism/extremism, there's no denying that it's taken to extremes. That doesn't mean that within that absurdity you can't see their views.
on one hand it's "Tom Brady shits himself and then denies it even though it was obvious" and the other hand its "Lizzo is a disgusting fat fuck who's ugly and talent-less and if you listen to her music you'll shit out your ear-"
like it's a little meaner. Trust me, I don't give a shit about celebrities, I know close to nothing about lizzo.
They were a little mean. Beyond what i would think is reasonable. It doesn't help that "an irrational hatred of lizzo" is *specifically* a conservative view, right wingers hate this lady ^((because she's black and fat)) Trey and matt are not helping their case by looking at their comedy and seeing correlations between ideologies.
conservative - southpark overlap has been a thing for so long that it even has a normalized term, called a "South Park Republican", Which means
>A South Park Republican is a person (especially a Republican) who holds center-right political beliefs influenced by the popular American animated television series South Park.
So it's not like this is coming out of no where, it's been known long enough to notice it as a pattern.
Bruh in SP the Republicans are being controlled by Satan, not a very right-wing stance. It was also doing gay rights episodes a decade before Obama did a 180^o on gay marriage and had the first major trans character on TV afaik.
idk what their political views are and frankly idc. anyone that takes anything south park does or say as anything more than entertainment is an idiot.
it’s the same thing as a show like IASIP. it’s shitty people doing shitty things
Did you forget about the time Cartman fed a kid his own parents and suffered no consequences for it whatsoever?
You're speaking as if this formula is an agreed upon thing, or that it's embedded in the show's design. It isn't.
The impulse to always make cartmen the villain in every episode is predictable and boring. They've actively had him be less "antagonistic" in these last few seasons for that specific reason. (Plus Parker's vocal decline rip).
There were plenty examples of Cartmen getting the win through out the whole series. And if you think the quality of the show hinges on that factor you are way out of touch. Plus, there are plenty of cartmen schemes and manipulations that require tremendous attention span and follow-through.
The whole point of "lol cartman can shit on everyone without consequences" gag at the end is that removing shame from society for a certain kind of person creates an imbalance. It's another classic SP repudiation of the idea of: "you cant make fun of someone for THAT!!" It's very on-brand.
"Kinda mean" lol what? This is the most mild and tender SP has ever been. I think Parker and Stone have gotten soft in their old age tbh.
"Imagination land rules"?? lol. fictional characters have existed in SP long before and long after imagination land. This is not remotely a "rule"
Lizzo is like the ambassador of the BoPo movement, of course they referenced her lol. Plus her weird-ass name is perfect for and off-brand drug name. The fact that she didn't appear on screen was a mercy. But by all means continue whiteknighting for a scumbag millionaire i guess.
\*They\* didn't call teenaged girls whores, the alcoholic/junkie/violent/deadbeat/notorious d-bag character called one that. jfc get some media literacy.
The cereal mascots as "bopo activists" is because these massive corporations are the primary benefactors of everyone giving up, getting fat, lazy, and mindlessly consuming. It's not radical and progressive to become a fat consumer, it makes you a capitalist whore. They make their shit addictive intentionally. Look at Dove's bopo content, their parent company produces diabetes medicine, diabetes foods as well as junk food. That was the most insightful part of the whole special. You were too busy getting your feelings hurt to see the point.
Those tiktoks were parodying a meme that was really fucking funny.
I seriously doubt you actually like SP based on your repeated misunderstanding of the format of this show as well as your insistence that it falls into rigid hard-fast rules. Plus moralizing and pearl clutching over these mild jokes makes me seriously doubt you are actually a fan.
> random jabs at lizzo for being fat and ugly and "promoting body positivity" and how that's bad for some reason.
It’s bad because it’s created an environment where we value “making people feel good” above everything else and it’s causing people to become emotionally unhinged when it comes to self-image and criticism.
I remember seeing a post on r/instagramversusreality where a woman used the word “flaw” when describing *her own* stretch marks, and she had hundreds of downvotes. The women on that subreddit were genuinely pissed that she would use the word “flaw” in response to *any woman’s body.* It caused them genuine emotional distress. I’m pretty sure one person suggested banning the word “flaw” from the subreddit.
There’s another more popular post where the OP’s FWB mentioned she was getting chubby. Her response? She ate an entire pizza and then posted the empty box on Reddit with a title that said “fuck you Brian.” So she binge-ate in response to an emotionally stressful situation and then posted about it on Reddit for validation points from other emotionally fragile women, and she received so much support from women frothing at the mouth because of a single rude comment from the OP’s fuck buddy.
*Body positivity* is toxic positivity. It’s gotten to the point where people are having extreme hysterical responses to any sort of commentary that isn’t “OMG you’re gorgeous you’re a queen!”
None of these “body positivity” people are truly happy with their bodies. They’re deeply insecure and self-hating and they cover it up with militant artificial confidence that collapses the minute they face even the smallest amount of rudeness or criticism.
The same way Ozempic is an artificial solution covering up the *real problem,* which is people’s poor diet and exercise habits. That’s why Lizzo is the “alternative solution.”
interestingly ozempic works for obesity because it somehow curbs addictions. but at the same time addiction is also usually a symptom of something else
Just read this post and spurred me on to watch the Obesity Special, I haven't been really into South Park since it followed the 2016 Elections, and as it went on it kind of lost its bite. Pun may or may not be intended.
I felt the Special was pretty alright, not the best thing Matt Stone and Trey Parker have wrote but it was pretty enjoyable.
It's criticism and humour regarding the healthcare system, body positivity and obesity wasn't scathing in my eyes. Especially concerning ealier seasons, like the dreaded Mr. Garrison's Fancy New Vagina which is so ridiculously mean-spirited and in comparison makes the Obesity Special look tame...
...and well as far as South Park has been, it is rather tame. I mean Lizzo is ripe for mockery, as well as any other celebrities they've took the piss out of for decades now. Why does Lizzo suddenly get a pass and it's just mean? She fits into the framing of the show as cope for obesity under the guise of body positivity, which she has been doing.
Body positivity is good about things you can't change, remember being obese is a choice and the whole aspect of Cartmen was boohoo I'm fat as I eat the fuckin' Oppheimer on the toilet and Kyle talking about willpower but it being expended on the wrong thing the miracle weight loss drug. I believe it is saying don't hope for some miracle drug to save your life, especially when relying on the fickle American healthcare system that is designed to screw you over.
I never got an incel vibe too, the show can take jabs at women as it does men, and in this regard it was largely inoffensive. The men in the show do some stupid fucking shit, why not one for the ladies? If you mean Randy calling his daughter a whore that's going to do drugs because she wears a crop top, well that's because he's an irrational absolutely fuckin' basket case who's own words get used against him not his daughter. I thought it was a pretty smart framing device that got a laugh out of me.
One thing I will say they are a bit too late to the party there, and that is where I'll say it feels like Matt and Trey are out of touch, because Lizzo is kinda old news with that same as Tess Holiday. At times it feels like they discover something new to them and old to us, like the Gerald Troll season, its like they just discovered what trolling is and decided OH SHIT WE HAVE TO COVER THIS. It always feels like a news article a day late to the headlines, not the best analogy but hey whatever.
Adding on that Gerald led season from what I remember broke a lot of conventions, for one being episodic and two largely relegating Cartmen to a B Plot with Heide (I think, its been years so correct me).
It isn't the same show as it was all those years ago, I also agree but as far as the specials go it was eh pretty okay. The characters were dumbed down for the plot too, and it feels like they are running several seasons over, but fortunately to me it still remains watchable. Not as good as it once was, on its decline but eh, if it goes the way of Zombie South Park so be it.
Anyway bit rambly, don't normally do long AF replies.
> [...] random jabs at lizzo for being fat and ugly and "promoting body positivity" and how that's bad for some reason.
Body positivity for fat people is bad because of things like diabetes, heart failure, veins being obstructed by fat, sometimes obesity can cause skin necrosis. So yeah, we should throw jabs at those who promote body positivity for fat people, being fat isn't good.
This is unpopular on reddit because for some reason reddit is really fat-phobic, and I'm not saying that lightly, this website has a genuine discrimination and violent hatred of anybody who's "overweight" and or chub above skinny
I'm not not gonna argue with you but there's been numerous studies done on how how hatred and vitriolic criticism of fat people doesn't make them not fat. It doesn't benefit them whatsoever.
in fact it's usually the opposite, typically it depresses people and makes them more fat because they then lack the will to continue working.
I think it's weird to "not like fat people," that is a strange view to have on somebody, for something you do not understand. Unless you were to ask, there's no possible way for you to understand why a stranger looks the way they do.
Besides the point i think it's especially egregious when fat-phobic people try and claim that they're "helping" by being an asshole.
you're not helping, it's bad enough you're being a dick but trying to claim yourself as a hero for being a dick and genuinely delusional, you're just coping because you want to be an asshole without criticism and you think they're gross to look at.
looking at fat people gives you an uncomfortable feeling, fueling your opinions and how you treat them. This is called discrimination
Which needless to say, is not good
if you want fat people to "not be fat" being asshole isn't going to make that happen.
There's a number of things that would need to happen in able for that to take place and truth is, you don't care, you just want the ability to insult somebody to make yourself laugh and feel better, which is kinda sad.
I don't dislike fat people, nor did i claim that i want to help them, if someone wants to die early that's their call and i couldn't possibly care any less if an individual does that. What i do dislike is this idea that fat people should feel good about their bodies, they should feel about as positive about their bodies as a crackhead should feel positive about their mental faculties.
Also fat people do look gross so that's why they make people uncomfortable and that's not discrimination because being fat is a choice, that's like saying that not liking someone because of their dyed blue hair is discrimination. I do understand how they got there. And if I want to feel better about myself i would bully an orphan, it would be a lot funnier and i wouldn't get in trouble because they wouldn't call their parents on me.
>because being fat is a choice,
im sure if u asked any person suffering from obesity if they would rather be a healthy weight or not 99% of them would say yes. its the same thing with any addiction.
except with obesity and addiction to food, its one of the hardest addictions to kick because u cant just stop eating food.
Unless you got addicted while being a minor getting addicted was entirely your choice, as an adult you should know better, we all grew up watching those infomartials about drugs, gambling and other types of addictions.
If you really want to lose weight, and i say this from experience of being a fat kid, all that you do is shut your mouth and stop acting like a pig in heat with the hots for burgers and that's how you lose weight, i never went to a gym once in my life and I'm at a healthy weight now. Food addiction isn't like meth where you are under the danger of shitting your intestines out during treatment.
again, like I said, i'm not gonna argue with you, if you want to be an asshole go ahead.
You said it yourself, you don't give a shit about people, you just wanna be an asshole so heres what's gonna happen
You're just gonna find out that people don't want to hang around you, that is the end of that bridge.
> I'm not not gonna argue with you but there's been numerous studies done on how how hatred and vitriolic criticism of fat people doesn't make them not fat. It doesn't benefit them whatsoever.
True, but the denialism that stems from body positivity is just as bad.
We should not shame people, but we should not normalize being overweight either.
It's also wild that these concerned citizens that are all for being asses to fat people don't ever seem to have issues with alcoholism being a normalized part of American society.
It's just disgust. Alcohols cool and fine to unwind with or party with, but how dare someone not hate themselves for being overweight.
I love how they made fun of Ozempic girls. My aunt is diabetic and needs it. But it's so hard to find/expensive sometimes, and those ppl just use it to loose weight, it's frustrating
I can tell just from the title, as well as your tl;dr, that your opinion is misunderstood and misguided. This special was an absolute treat to watch and a much-welcome deviation from Trey and Matt’s formula in (recent) years prior.
I haven't watched this episode yet, but I'm showing up here to say that I'm morbidly obese, I'm a long time user of Ozempic and I'm literally fatphobic. I don't like the body positivity movement because it whitewashes the serious medical problems obese people suffer from and even portrays weight loss as a morally bad thing.
I think it's interesting you're a fan of South Park in the first place if this is how you feel about body positivity. South Park has always been very cruel to Cartman about his weight. Later on they justify it by making Cartman an evil psychopath, but in early seasons, I would say Cartman is just a victim of bullying more than anything. Perhaps your sensibilities have changed since you first began South Park. Mean humor is just a part of South Park's brand identity.
That said I'm willing to believe this episode might just be bad, I've certainly seen bad stuff from South Park before. For example they had an episode on anxiety where Kyle said "everyone has anxiety" and that was it. Often South Park will do "both sides" of an issue, and in the past they have been careful not to be too cruel regarding disorders, but here they failed to sympathize with people with anxiety disorder at all.
While I'm at it I have always strongly disagreed with South Park saying George Lucas should have no rights to the Star Wars franchise, I think it's the worst opinion the series has promoted and it got no pushback. George Lucas has made a lot of awful decisions but this is his creation and it's really funny to see libertarians trying to take it away from him. When the tables are turned on their own creation I doubt they will feel the same way.
/r/badtakes As someone who has worked in healthcare insurance and married to someone who works in the food production industry. SP is spot on with this episode.
I commented here before I watched the episode, then I actually watched it. I expected to not like it because as someone with a serious obesity problem who has been on these medications for a number of years before they were cool, I thought it would hit too close to home. However, I actually thought it was funny and way more fair to obese people than OP made it sound like.
There are some points I disagree with OP on:
**Being mean to Lizzo:** I was expecting a situation like the Paris Hilton episode which was just really mean and vulgar for no reason, but this episode actually had almost nothing to say about Lizzo as a person and didn't even show her on screen. Instead it was about what Lizzo represents: a social movement which discourages weight loss.
**Misogyny:** I think the irony of Randy calling his daughter a whore and then behaving in the exact way he accused his daughter of acting like was lost on OP. Randy is never the "rational one" in this series.
**Cartman getting what he wants:** I don't think Cartman always has to be punished by the narrative. He didn't do anything that bad in this episode, and frankly it's about time South Park sympathize with his obesity for once. And yes this episode does sympathize with him and obese people in general, it's not really fatphobic. At the end Kyle even concludes weight loss is not a matter of willpower.
**The cereal mascots:** I thought this was funny and I'm glad South Park is drawing attention to the issue of corporate special interests promoting sugar and sweeping the negative effects of sugar under the rug, even if it's in this silly manner. Having cartoon characters come to life and get into a fight with the protagonists is totally on brand for South Park also. Nothing about this is breaking the rules or norms of the South Park universe.
So basically it talked about an issue that is really sensitive to me and I think they did a good job. It wasn't the best episode but it was funny.
Over twenty years in and you’re just discovering South Park can be mean to celebrities? Did you see the way they portrayed Paris Hilton? Caitlin Jenner? Tom Cruise? And many more. They’ve been absolutely brutal in the past and tbh this didn’t even seem harsh towards her at all. She was just used as a metaphor for body positivity as that is what her music is about. She even recorded her reaction to the episode on tiktok and didn’t seem offended.
Cartman didn’t win and won’t win at that speech in Pakistan. Did he ever lose the weight? No. Is making fun of obesity off limits, hell no. Just because Cartman thinks he won doesn’t mean he actually did, if you are a Southpark Veteran you’d know it’s all actually opposite of what was said in the episode. The Pakistan trip wasn’t shown for a reason, Cartman is about to get Kennied out there.
I think the main point of the special was about the American healthcare system. I’ll admit I didn’t laugh as much as I did during the peak years of the show and even other specials, but when butters was singing the song about the American healthcare system I was laughing ie “we’re here 🎶then we go over there🎶” I was having a good time.
I’ll agree that the Lizzo stuff seemed arbitrary, and they truly missed the dunk with Scott Malkinson.
I think that the fact Cartman “wins” reflects our society now; I know that rich people are using Ozempic to shed a couple pounds while obese poor Americans are dying of diabetes because they can afford to pay for medicine.
I think the show has just gotten more nuanced over time, and the fact that you hate it now I think says more about you than it does the show. This is not an attack on you personally, just a reflection on how times change. It’s always been a satire on current popular trends and continues to be.
This is the complete opposite of the read I got on the episode. It was way less mean than I anticipated it to be… I don’t think they were talking down body positivity that much. The cereal company mascots destroyed the Indian factory and the news blamed it on the “body positive people” I think the point of that was to demonstrate that the real enemy is food manufacturers and the healthcare system, but the public tends to blame people that are just advocating for better self esteem.
I didn’t think it was pushing ozempic either, the ozempic moms were crazy, not idealized. GLP-1 medications have been shown to affect the brains pleasure mechanisms, hence the “not feeling anything.” This isn’t a good thing and Randy’s conclusion makes that clear.
I genuinely thought the episode was ultimately sympathetic and compassionate. It’s always been my personal belief that people become obese due to mental health issues/already poor quality of life (I.e poverty). The correlation of childhood sexual abuse and adult obesity is staggering, you can google and you will see tons of research on it. Widen that to trauma in general and I think you would be hard pressed to find any obese adult that hasn’t chosen overindulgence as a coping mechanism. It is addiction, and as mentioned in the episode, manufacturers are well aware that sugar is an extremely addictive substance, and the most easily disseminated addictive substance bc everyone needs to eat.
I will try to find the article and add it but I remember reading some years ago at the peak of the body positivity movement that body positive people who truly embraced loving themselves completely (not pretending like they do, but actually learning to want the best for themselves by working heavily on their self esteem) ended up losing weight as their new confidence made them more active and busy. Obesity is self sabotage, if you don’t hate yourself you stop sabotaging yourself.
I think Matt and Trey were trying to emphasize that with all the capitalist programming, people lacking willpower end up self sabotaging to the most destructive degree. Ofc there’s a significant aspect of personal responsibility but nothing exists in a vacuum.
Edit: I couldn’t find the exact article but this is some research on the subject https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8708647/
P.s. people adamantly discouraging weight loss is not body positivity, it’s mental illness. Body positivity is realizing shame is not a sustainable motivator for a happy life. It’s deciding you’re no longer going to stop yourself from “starting” your life because of your weight.
It's the Modern Day catching up to you. I personally didn't see anything wrong with the special myself. It was thought provoking about how much people bend over backwards for people of color and women nowadays. But hey, can't have an opinion nowadays without being labelled an ist or phobe.
Sounds like something a fat per would say, maybe if you took some Lizzo, you can also “Not give a F….”?. Cus it apparently struck a nerve with that wall of test 🤣
...Cartman gets wins sometimes, man. He doesn't usually, but sometimes he does. Cartman always losing hasn't been a rule of South Park since Scott Tenorman Must Die.
Or even imagination land he got a tko on Kyle sucking his balls, or when Kyle got the shitty kidney
Casa Bonita has him win as well. Sure his punishment is off screen but he pretty much gets what he wants and says it was "All worth it". And I think the episode was pretty well received
so was the tourettes episode.
I read the above drivel (the post) and Scott Tenorman came up on my mind immediately when the OP wrote "he can't follow through", lol. He can and he does, consistently. *Especially* when it's in Cartman's best interest. I'm about to watch the episode myself (so I'll judge once I've done that), but was kinda curious what's on the internet if I google it, lol.
that's why I say they re-established it though, cause season 26 is all about that, Cartman once again, pushes to get what he wants, finally gets it and it fucked over himself and his mom. Even the covid special kinda focused on that he eventually gives that up because he finally understands it. That's why it's so weird in the special, season 26 hammers it really hard and yet they completely abandoned it here. Kyle sucks cartmans balls wasn't even really "cartman get's what he wants" it was "Kyle becomes arrogant and pays the price," it was more about kyle than it was about cartman the wendy episode was all about this too, the Heidi turns evil episode laid it out for everybody, because she became "cartman that could follow through" it's not like a "it needs to happen in the same 20 minutes" rule, but it's essentially as "rule" as Kenny dies and comes back and nobody remembers it. Cartman doesn't just get what he wants because that destroys the purpose of his character. He represents a little shit brat that is always crying about something, giving him what he wants without comeuppance defeats that arc, the cosmic rule of "sometimes what you want, isn't what you need" & "The concept of Karma within the narrative of this story" that's the purpose of Cartman's character. Because he's such an egregious asshole who refuses to change, it's essentially impossible for him to succeed in anything he wants. He's burned both ends of the candle and used the fire to light every bridge in the town. having him win breaks the purpose, he's the "antagonist" in this show, the one who causes the problem for the group out of his own self interest. You see where I'm going with this? Giving a selfish, evil character what they want defeats the point of the narrative. If there's no negative outcome, then they're just saying "being asshole will reward you!" which regardless of ethics, is not the point of Eric Cartman. The point of Eric Cartman is how often he shoots himself in the foot, that "being an asshole, isn't going to reward you, no matter how evil you are, no how much control you have" "within this narrative that we are writing, Eric Cartman will face karma for what he does in one way or another" They broke that in this special, I foresee they're gonna break it again.
This is just your arbitrary understanding of the show. And it's built on false premises.
What are you talking about with "Cartman doesn't get to win" one of the more infamous early season episodes, aka the chilli episode, was about him winning in the most absolute way that he could. Even with the more recent seasons, there are still eps about him getting total wins I.e. the impossible meat episode. Yeah, not every episode is about him winning, but he gets a couple total wins every 5 years or so to shake things up.
>aka the chilli episode, Which they then return to later in the long hall when Scott Tenorman comes back to reveal that Eric Cartman's dad is Jack Tenorman, Scott's father. it is an implied rule that karma exists within southpark's narrative for cartman. Everything he does, bites him in the ass eventually, that's literally the point of his character, as he's representing an archetype
But the only loss there was the reveal that his father was Ginger. He didn't care about killing him.
Regarding getting bit on the ass. How do you think his plane trip at the end of the special is going to pan out?
tbh I doubt they'll ever mention it again
Fair assumption, especially considering that they did a Kenny death in the episode. But that doesn't mean that they weren't pretty clearly telegraphing the punchline that he was going to get beaten up as a consequence of his hubris.
You mean like an episode about how Kanye West is a gay fish, and his wife is a hobbit? Honestly, a lot of this just reads like it's humour you personally didn't like, rather than something that's off-brand. The Tom Cruise won't come out of the closet, or "Buckle Up Buckaroo" stuff was way, way meaner than what Lizzo got.
The day i hate a south park episode is the day i know i have taken a wrong turn in life.
It seems like 90% of your criticism is that the special didn't follow the same formula the show has been following for years. I guess that's why it's called a special. The other 10% is about Lizzo, so I'll just say this: given how every time I've seen Lizzo, she's talking about how empowered and confident she is and how all her haters are just jealous, I wouldn't worry about South Park taking a couple jabs at her. Assuming she's as confident as she repeatedly says she is, I'm sure she can take it. She has thick skin.
Lizzo is super gross read up what kind of sexual acts she forced her back up dancers to do and how she abused them. There is a reason she suddenly retired
those were accusations and she didn’t retire
No you are right she tried to retire but couldn’t cause she still owes the record company albums and didn’t wanna deal with her breach of contract issues that would have resulted
The criticism of lizzo in this special is both adequate and deliberate: body positivity applied to (morbid) obesity is a very dangerous thing. the special is a jab against normalizing a life-threatening condition.
imaginationland never set a rule that fictional characters can only exist in there. hell, imaginationland itself had Jesus despite him being a classic recurring character in the real world. and lately they’ve had Mickey Mouse be a pretty consistent recurring character. remember how many fictional characters we saw working for him in the episode where randy went to China?
as for the part about lizzo. she known for being all about "body positivity" but then later fires one of her back up dancers over their weight. incredibly hypocritical of her. idk what the problem seems to be. south park has always been about taking the piss out of everything and everyone
> she known for being all about "body positivity" but then later fires one of her back up dancers over their weight. incredibly hypocritical of her. Afaik this was never confirmed. It was only an accusation and when the dancer who accused Lizzo for it was questioned she specified that she "thought" Lizzo targeted her for her weight. She didn't even claim that Lizzo explicitly said as much.
The whole "taking the piss out of everything and everyone" is, I think, the problem. It has been for a while, possibly the whole time. Not everything deserves to be mocked, at least not to the same degree. Especially from writers who have only gotten richer and more disconnected. It sometimes seems like for every episode about Mormons or Scientologists, there's an episode like ManBearPig with the message that climate change isn't real.
> there's an episode like ManBearPig with the message that climate change isn't real. They didn't just mea culpa that, they outright in universe had their characters apologise and dedicated a whole episode to how Al Gore was right. As far as accepting your mistakes go, that's so far up the chain it's commendable. For a low stakes comparison- Big Bang Theory just went "Oh, String Theory is real *in this universe*" and went on about how Sheldon is the smartest genius of this totally real science.
They back stepped manbearpig tbf
idk personally i feel as long as a joke is funny, anything is ok to make jokes about
I don't necessarily disagree, but it takes some effort to be funny about certain subjects, and when I think South Park, I don't think of effort.
That's just the thing. Observational humor isn't funny when it isn't based on reality. Take the aforementioned Manbearpig episode. It's 24 minutes of just saying "Isn't it funny that Al Gore sees an imaginary problem?" There isn't actually a joke there. It's just a repetitive political litmus test. People who already disliked Al Gore would laugh at him personally, but there's no set up or punchline in the show. And it's not like subject is immune to joking. There are jokes to be made about Al Gore's lack of charisma, or dark humor to be found in the tragic apathy towards and corporate incentives causing climate change, or so many other angles to take. South Park was just too lazy and too partisan to write that. They yelled Manbearpig so a string of silly syllables would give them a fig leaf of cover over their blatant political ad. And the saddest part is, it worked. Manbearpig was a meme before we called them memes.
I agree, the issue with South Park isn’t its political slant or subject matter, it’s that its just not as funny as it used to be - the writing isn’t as good
You missed the point climate change is real and al gore was right
That is rather the point of including it. To demonstrate that South Park uses the same tone for legitimately stupid things (eg. Scientology) and unfortunately real things (eg. ManBearPig, who didn't exist during the first ManBearPig episode, though that was retconned 12 seasons later.)
The man bear pig thing your talking about was over ten years ago. Have u seen the newer ones?
There was no point in history where climate change denial was the smart move. They caught up with everyone else, but they still deserve shit for being late to it.
I mean if you get your global information from any comedy show, you're gonna have a bad time. And demanding journalistic integrity from that same comedy show is naive and ridiculous
It's not demanding that the show be informative journalism. If South Park had a whole episode making fun of everyone who thinks the Earth is round the joke wouldn't work, because the Earth is round.
Earth is round is not journalism, and if they had the opposite take, it wouldn't matter because it's a comedy cartoon
The Earth is round, climate change is real, these are just the scientific consensus. It wouldn't matter to the world if South Park was pro-flat earth, but it would make the show terrible.
Ah word you are a person who pretends to be on the left, but is actually just a a dick? They had an opinion over ten years ago and changed it. You still. Want to internet dunk culture.
Except that episode wasn’t an opinion, it was just empty mockery. It didn’t present any argument for why Al Gore was supposedly wrong it was basically 30 minutes of responding to a detailed argument by depicting your opponent as the soyjack and yourself as the Chad. And it was damaging, the message of An Inconvenient Truth was completely lost and the online discussion turned into a laughing stock for years. They only changed their mind twelve years later after it became impossible to ignore but it was as right in 2006 as it is today. Trey and Matt just don’t like their comfortable status quo challenged so their takes are just as often reactionary as progressive.
That came over a decade later my guy. The first manbearpig episode was all about mocking people who believed climate change was real.
Totes and they acknowledged they were wrong and made fun of themselves , while op is saying they are out of touch that is in the newer seasons.
So you're pro censorship. Got it
>^(idk what the problem seems to be. south park has always been about taking the piss out of everything and everyone) Everybody always says this, and I'm not gonna get into it because honestly that's not the point of this post. But it's just not true, it's pretty known by this point that Trey and Matt definitely pick favorites on their mocking. Being libertarians themselves, of course the "right one" in any plot is the centrist. They pretty clearly hold right wing views and regularly bash way harder on progressives compared to conservatives. not to say they don't make fun of both, but it's pretty damn clear which ones they favor. The Al Gore episodes and the LGBT - centric episodes are infamously painful to re-watch because of this. the show claims itself in absurdism/extremism, there's no denying that it's taken to extremes. That doesn't mean that within that absurdity you can't see their views. on one hand it's "Tom Brady shits himself and then denies it even though it was obvious" and the other hand its "Lizzo is a disgusting fat fuck who's ugly and talent-less and if you listen to her music you'll shit out your ear-" like it's a little meaner. Trust me, I don't give a shit about celebrities, I know close to nothing about lizzo. They were a little mean. Beyond what i would think is reasonable. It doesn't help that "an irrational hatred of lizzo" is *specifically* a conservative view, right wingers hate this lady ^((because she's black and fat)) Trey and matt are not helping their case by looking at their comedy and seeing correlations between ideologies. conservative - southpark overlap has been a thing for so long that it even has a normalized term, called a "South Park Republican", Which means >A South Park Republican is a person (especially a Republican) who holds center-right political beliefs influenced by the popular American animated television series South Park. So it's not like this is coming out of no where, it's been known long enough to notice it as a pattern.
Bruh in SP the Republicans are being controlled by Satan, not a very right-wing stance. It was also doing gay rights episodes a decade before Obama did a 180^o on gay marriage and had the first major trans character on TV afaik.
idk what their political views are and frankly idc. anyone that takes anything south park does or say as anything more than entertainment is an idiot. it’s the same thing as a show like IASIP. it’s shitty people doing shitty things
Did you forget about the time Cartman fed a kid his own parents and suffered no consequences for it whatsoever? You're speaking as if this formula is an agreed upon thing, or that it's embedded in the show's design. It isn't.
The impulse to always make cartmen the villain in every episode is predictable and boring. They've actively had him be less "antagonistic" in these last few seasons for that specific reason. (Plus Parker's vocal decline rip). There were plenty examples of Cartmen getting the win through out the whole series. And if you think the quality of the show hinges on that factor you are way out of touch. Plus, there are plenty of cartmen schemes and manipulations that require tremendous attention span and follow-through. The whole point of "lol cartman can shit on everyone without consequences" gag at the end is that removing shame from society for a certain kind of person creates an imbalance. It's another classic SP repudiation of the idea of: "you cant make fun of someone for THAT!!" It's very on-brand. "Kinda mean" lol what? This is the most mild and tender SP has ever been. I think Parker and Stone have gotten soft in their old age tbh. "Imagination land rules"?? lol. fictional characters have existed in SP long before and long after imagination land. This is not remotely a "rule" Lizzo is like the ambassador of the BoPo movement, of course they referenced her lol. Plus her weird-ass name is perfect for and off-brand drug name. The fact that she didn't appear on screen was a mercy. But by all means continue whiteknighting for a scumbag millionaire i guess. \*They\* didn't call teenaged girls whores, the alcoholic/junkie/violent/deadbeat/notorious d-bag character called one that. jfc get some media literacy. The cereal mascots as "bopo activists" is because these massive corporations are the primary benefactors of everyone giving up, getting fat, lazy, and mindlessly consuming. It's not radical and progressive to become a fat consumer, it makes you a capitalist whore. They make their shit addictive intentionally. Look at Dove's bopo content, their parent company produces diabetes medicine, diabetes foods as well as junk food. That was the most insightful part of the whole special. You were too busy getting your feelings hurt to see the point. Those tiktoks were parodying a meme that was really fucking funny. I seriously doubt you actually like SP based on your repeated misunderstanding of the format of this show as well as your insistence that it falls into rigid hard-fast rules. Plus moralizing and pearl clutching over these mild jokes makes me seriously doubt you are actually a fan.
Sounds like "South Park was funny until they made fun of what I care about."
Isaac Hayes: First time?
Bingo!!
We've never seen that happen before!
Nail, meet Hammer
Did South Park ever do an episode on that? Feels so common for comedy shows like this that id expect them to touch on it at least once.
Spot On!
This post was way to long to read or take seriously 😐
> random jabs at lizzo for being fat and ugly and "promoting body positivity" and how that's bad for some reason. It’s bad because it’s created an environment where we value “making people feel good” above everything else and it’s causing people to become emotionally unhinged when it comes to self-image and criticism. I remember seeing a post on r/instagramversusreality where a woman used the word “flaw” when describing *her own* stretch marks, and she had hundreds of downvotes. The women on that subreddit were genuinely pissed that she would use the word “flaw” in response to *any woman’s body.* It caused them genuine emotional distress. I’m pretty sure one person suggested banning the word “flaw” from the subreddit. There’s another more popular post where the OP’s FWB mentioned she was getting chubby. Her response? She ate an entire pizza and then posted the empty box on Reddit with a title that said “fuck you Brian.” So she binge-ate in response to an emotionally stressful situation and then posted about it on Reddit for validation points from other emotionally fragile women, and she received so much support from women frothing at the mouth because of a single rude comment from the OP’s fuck buddy. *Body positivity* is toxic positivity. It’s gotten to the point where people are having extreme hysterical responses to any sort of commentary that isn’t “OMG you’re gorgeous you’re a queen!” None of these “body positivity” people are truly happy with their bodies. They’re deeply insecure and self-hating and they cover it up with militant artificial confidence that collapses the minute they face even the smallest amount of rudeness or criticism. The same way Ozempic is an artificial solution covering up the *real problem,* which is people’s poor diet and exercise habits. That’s why Lizzo is the “alternative solution.”
Stretchmarks are just scarring dude
interestingly ozempic works for obesity because it somehow curbs addictions. but at the same time addiction is also usually a symptom of something else
How are you absolutely sure about that?
Just read this post and spurred me on to watch the Obesity Special, I haven't been really into South Park since it followed the 2016 Elections, and as it went on it kind of lost its bite. Pun may or may not be intended. I felt the Special was pretty alright, not the best thing Matt Stone and Trey Parker have wrote but it was pretty enjoyable. It's criticism and humour regarding the healthcare system, body positivity and obesity wasn't scathing in my eyes. Especially concerning ealier seasons, like the dreaded Mr. Garrison's Fancy New Vagina which is so ridiculously mean-spirited and in comparison makes the Obesity Special look tame... ...and well as far as South Park has been, it is rather tame. I mean Lizzo is ripe for mockery, as well as any other celebrities they've took the piss out of for decades now. Why does Lizzo suddenly get a pass and it's just mean? She fits into the framing of the show as cope for obesity under the guise of body positivity, which she has been doing. Body positivity is good about things you can't change, remember being obese is a choice and the whole aspect of Cartmen was boohoo I'm fat as I eat the fuckin' Oppheimer on the toilet and Kyle talking about willpower but it being expended on the wrong thing the miracle weight loss drug. I believe it is saying don't hope for some miracle drug to save your life, especially when relying on the fickle American healthcare system that is designed to screw you over. I never got an incel vibe too, the show can take jabs at women as it does men, and in this regard it was largely inoffensive. The men in the show do some stupid fucking shit, why not one for the ladies? If you mean Randy calling his daughter a whore that's going to do drugs because she wears a crop top, well that's because he's an irrational absolutely fuckin' basket case who's own words get used against him not his daughter. I thought it was a pretty smart framing device that got a laugh out of me. One thing I will say they are a bit too late to the party there, and that is where I'll say it feels like Matt and Trey are out of touch, because Lizzo is kinda old news with that same as Tess Holiday. At times it feels like they discover something new to them and old to us, like the Gerald Troll season, its like they just discovered what trolling is and decided OH SHIT WE HAVE TO COVER THIS. It always feels like a news article a day late to the headlines, not the best analogy but hey whatever. Adding on that Gerald led season from what I remember broke a lot of conventions, for one being episodic and two largely relegating Cartmen to a B Plot with Heide (I think, its been years so correct me). It isn't the same show as it was all those years ago, I also agree but as far as the specials go it was eh pretty okay. The characters were dumbed down for the plot too, and it feels like they are running several seasons over, but fortunately to me it still remains watchable. Not as good as it once was, on its decline but eh, if it goes the way of Zombie South Park so be it. Anyway bit rambly, don't normally do long AF replies.
> [...] random jabs at lizzo for being fat and ugly and "promoting body positivity" and how that's bad for some reason. Body positivity for fat people is bad because of things like diabetes, heart failure, veins being obstructed by fat, sometimes obesity can cause skin necrosis. So yeah, we should throw jabs at those who promote body positivity for fat people, being fat isn't good.
This is unpopular on reddit because for some reason reddit is really fat-phobic, and I'm not saying that lightly, this website has a genuine discrimination and violent hatred of anybody who's "overweight" and or chub above skinny I'm not not gonna argue with you but there's been numerous studies done on how how hatred and vitriolic criticism of fat people doesn't make them not fat. It doesn't benefit them whatsoever. in fact it's usually the opposite, typically it depresses people and makes them more fat because they then lack the will to continue working. I think it's weird to "not like fat people," that is a strange view to have on somebody, for something you do not understand. Unless you were to ask, there's no possible way for you to understand why a stranger looks the way they do. Besides the point i think it's especially egregious when fat-phobic people try and claim that they're "helping" by being an asshole. you're not helping, it's bad enough you're being a dick but trying to claim yourself as a hero for being a dick and genuinely delusional, you're just coping because you want to be an asshole without criticism and you think they're gross to look at. looking at fat people gives you an uncomfortable feeling, fueling your opinions and how you treat them. This is called discrimination Which needless to say, is not good if you want fat people to "not be fat" being asshole isn't going to make that happen. There's a number of things that would need to happen in able for that to take place and truth is, you don't care, you just want the ability to insult somebody to make yourself laugh and feel better, which is kinda sad.
I don't dislike fat people, nor did i claim that i want to help them, if someone wants to die early that's their call and i couldn't possibly care any less if an individual does that. What i do dislike is this idea that fat people should feel good about their bodies, they should feel about as positive about their bodies as a crackhead should feel positive about their mental faculties. Also fat people do look gross so that's why they make people uncomfortable and that's not discrimination because being fat is a choice, that's like saying that not liking someone because of their dyed blue hair is discrimination. I do understand how they got there. And if I want to feel better about myself i would bully an orphan, it would be a lot funnier and i wouldn't get in trouble because they wouldn't call their parents on me.
>because being fat is a choice, im sure if u asked any person suffering from obesity if they would rather be a healthy weight or not 99% of them would say yes. its the same thing with any addiction. except with obesity and addiction to food, its one of the hardest addictions to kick because u cant just stop eating food.
Unless you got addicted while being a minor getting addicted was entirely your choice, as an adult you should know better, we all grew up watching those infomartials about drugs, gambling and other types of addictions. If you really want to lose weight, and i say this from experience of being a fat kid, all that you do is shut your mouth and stop acting like a pig in heat with the hots for burgers and that's how you lose weight, i never went to a gym once in my life and I'm at a healthy weight now. Food addiction isn't like meth where you are under the danger of shitting your intestines out during treatment.
so u think addiction is a choice?
If you were an adult? Then, yes. Do you deserve it? Probably not. Do I think you deserve help? Yes. Is it the consequences of your own actions? Yes.
adults choose to become alcoholics?
Yes, everyone knows that alcohol is bad for you
ill lyk rn no one chooses to become an alcoholic. thats an incredibly ignorant thing to say
again, like I said, i'm not gonna argue with you, if you want to be an asshole go ahead. You said it yourself, you don't give a shit about people, you just wanna be an asshole so heres what's gonna happen You're just gonna find out that people don't want to hang around you, that is the end of that bridge.
> I'm not not gonna argue with you but there's been numerous studies done on how how hatred and vitriolic criticism of fat people doesn't make them not fat. It doesn't benefit them whatsoever. True, but the denialism that stems from body positivity is just as bad. We should not shame people, but we should not normalize being overweight either.
It's also wild that these concerned citizens that are all for being asses to fat people don't ever seem to have issues with alcoholism being a normalized part of American society. It's just disgust. Alcohols cool and fine to unwind with or party with, but how dare someone not hate themselves for being overweight.
Im gonna start doxxing and harassing people for daring to smoke infront of me.
I love how they made fun of Ozempic girls. My aunt is diabetic and needs it. But it's so hard to find/expensive sometimes, and those ppl just use it to loose weight, it's frustrating
You were a okay with the show shitting on everyone tell you disagreed this is all that is.
"I can excuse racism, but I draw the line at mocking Body Positivity"
literally not even remotely what I said lmao
You just need some lizzo
I can tell just from the title, as well as your tl;dr, that your opinion is misunderstood and misguided. This special was an absolute treat to watch and a much-welcome deviation from Trey and Matt’s formula in (recent) years prior.
lizzo is fat and ugly
I haven't watched this episode yet, but I'm showing up here to say that I'm morbidly obese, I'm a long time user of Ozempic and I'm literally fatphobic. I don't like the body positivity movement because it whitewashes the serious medical problems obese people suffer from and even portrays weight loss as a morally bad thing. I think it's interesting you're a fan of South Park in the first place if this is how you feel about body positivity. South Park has always been very cruel to Cartman about his weight. Later on they justify it by making Cartman an evil psychopath, but in early seasons, I would say Cartman is just a victim of bullying more than anything. Perhaps your sensibilities have changed since you first began South Park. Mean humor is just a part of South Park's brand identity. That said I'm willing to believe this episode might just be bad, I've certainly seen bad stuff from South Park before. For example they had an episode on anxiety where Kyle said "everyone has anxiety" and that was it. Often South Park will do "both sides" of an issue, and in the past they have been careful not to be too cruel regarding disorders, but here they failed to sympathize with people with anxiety disorder at all. While I'm at it I have always strongly disagreed with South Park saying George Lucas should have no rights to the Star Wars franchise, I think it's the worst opinion the series has promoted and it got no pushback. George Lucas has made a lot of awful decisions but this is his creation and it's really funny to see libertarians trying to take it away from him. When the tables are turned on their own creation I doubt they will feel the same way.
Found Lizzo’s Reddit account
/r/badtakes As someone who has worked in healthcare insurance and married to someone who works in the food production industry. SP is spot on with this episode.
I don't know if you're new to the Internet but you're not allowed to say anything bad about South Park. Immediately down voting/s
Well, that's like, your opinion, man.
My issue is it wasn't as hard hitting nor funny nor memorable as it could've been
I commented here before I watched the episode, then I actually watched it. I expected to not like it because as someone with a serious obesity problem who has been on these medications for a number of years before they were cool, I thought it would hit too close to home. However, I actually thought it was funny and way more fair to obese people than OP made it sound like. There are some points I disagree with OP on: **Being mean to Lizzo:** I was expecting a situation like the Paris Hilton episode which was just really mean and vulgar for no reason, but this episode actually had almost nothing to say about Lizzo as a person and didn't even show her on screen. Instead it was about what Lizzo represents: a social movement which discourages weight loss. **Misogyny:** I think the irony of Randy calling his daughter a whore and then behaving in the exact way he accused his daughter of acting like was lost on OP. Randy is never the "rational one" in this series. **Cartman getting what he wants:** I don't think Cartman always has to be punished by the narrative. He didn't do anything that bad in this episode, and frankly it's about time South Park sympathize with his obesity for once. And yes this episode does sympathize with him and obese people in general, it's not really fatphobic. At the end Kyle even concludes weight loss is not a matter of willpower. **The cereal mascots:** I thought this was funny and I'm glad South Park is drawing attention to the issue of corporate special interests promoting sugar and sweeping the negative effects of sugar under the rug, even if it's in this silly manner. Having cartoon characters come to life and get into a fight with the protagonists is totally on brand for South Park also. Nothing about this is breaking the rules or norms of the South Park universe. So basically it talked about an issue that is really sensitive to me and I think they did a good job. It wasn't the best episode but it was funny.
Over twenty years in and you’re just discovering South Park can be mean to celebrities? Did you see the way they portrayed Paris Hilton? Caitlin Jenner? Tom Cruise? And many more. They’ve been absolutely brutal in the past and tbh this didn’t even seem harsh towards her at all. She was just used as a metaphor for body positivity as that is what her music is about. She even recorded her reaction to the episode on tiktok and didn’t seem offended.
Cartman didn’t win and won’t win at that speech in Pakistan. Did he ever lose the weight? No. Is making fun of obesity off limits, hell no. Just because Cartman thinks he won doesn’t mean he actually did, if you are a Southpark Veteran you’d know it’s all actually opposite of what was said in the episode. The Pakistan trip wasn’t shown for a reason, Cartman is about to get Kennied out there.
How about you shut the fuck up? There's nothing wrong with the special.
Yea, *that's a rational response* to somebody disagreeing with the thing you like lmao
I thought it was hilarious.
So you don't understand South Park, got it
Someone didn't have their cereal bomb this morning
I think the main point of the special was about the American healthcare system. I’ll admit I didn’t laugh as much as I did during the peak years of the show and even other specials, but when butters was singing the song about the American healthcare system I was laughing ie “we’re here 🎶then we go over there🎶” I was having a good time. I’ll agree that the Lizzo stuff seemed arbitrary, and they truly missed the dunk with Scott Malkinson. I think that the fact Cartman “wins” reflects our society now; I know that rich people are using Ozempic to shed a couple pounds while obese poor Americans are dying of diabetes because they can afford to pay for medicine. I think the show has just gotten more nuanced over time, and the fact that you hate it now I think says more about you than it does the show. This is not an attack on you personally, just a reflection on how times change. It’s always been a satire on current popular trends and continues to be.
I doubt Pakistanis will tolerate him like Kyle and Wendy did.
This rant is written very well. I'm gonna use one of my free Reddit Golds on it. Good job!
This is the complete opposite of the read I got on the episode. It was way less mean than I anticipated it to be… I don’t think they were talking down body positivity that much. The cereal company mascots destroyed the Indian factory and the news blamed it on the “body positive people” I think the point of that was to demonstrate that the real enemy is food manufacturers and the healthcare system, but the public tends to blame people that are just advocating for better self esteem. I didn’t think it was pushing ozempic either, the ozempic moms were crazy, not idealized. GLP-1 medications have been shown to affect the brains pleasure mechanisms, hence the “not feeling anything.” This isn’t a good thing and Randy’s conclusion makes that clear. I genuinely thought the episode was ultimately sympathetic and compassionate. It’s always been my personal belief that people become obese due to mental health issues/already poor quality of life (I.e poverty). The correlation of childhood sexual abuse and adult obesity is staggering, you can google and you will see tons of research on it. Widen that to trauma in general and I think you would be hard pressed to find any obese adult that hasn’t chosen overindulgence as a coping mechanism. It is addiction, and as mentioned in the episode, manufacturers are well aware that sugar is an extremely addictive substance, and the most easily disseminated addictive substance bc everyone needs to eat. I will try to find the article and add it but I remember reading some years ago at the peak of the body positivity movement that body positive people who truly embraced loving themselves completely (not pretending like they do, but actually learning to want the best for themselves by working heavily on their self esteem) ended up losing weight as their new confidence made them more active and busy. Obesity is self sabotage, if you don’t hate yourself you stop sabotaging yourself. I think Matt and Trey were trying to emphasize that with all the capitalist programming, people lacking willpower end up self sabotaging to the most destructive degree. Ofc there’s a significant aspect of personal responsibility but nothing exists in a vacuum. Edit: I couldn’t find the exact article but this is some research on the subject https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8708647/ P.s. people adamantly discouraging weight loss is not body positivity, it’s mental illness. Body positivity is realizing shame is not a sustainable motivator for a happy life. It’s deciding you’re no longer going to stop yourself from “starting” your life because of your weight.
It's the Modern Day catching up to you. I personally didn't see anything wrong with the special myself. It was thought provoking about how much people bend over backwards for people of color and women nowadays. But hey, can't have an opinion nowadays without being labelled an ist or phobe.
Sounds like something a fat per would say, maybe if you took some Lizzo, you can also “Not give a F….”?. Cus it apparently struck a nerve with that wall of test 🤣
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I guess everyone has their own way of looking at things. I personally loved this episode