South Park Gets Its Comeuppance

So, I'm watching part two of the "Cartoon Wars" South Park episode, in which Cartman (in cahoots with Bart Simpson, no less) figures out how to get Fox to take Family Guy off the air. I'm ruining the plot here, but he's unsuccessful, and Fox airs a uncensored episode of Family Guy as planned.

Now, I've mentioned this "censored episode" before, but I didn't tell you why it was so "inflammatory." In one of the show's random jokes, there was a depiction of the Islamic prophet Mohammed. On the show, Fox censored the image because various Islamic terrorist organizations claimed they would retaliate if the image of Mohammed was shown. So, Fox censored the image from Family Guy. After Cartman's plot to have another episode containing Mohammed pulled from the air, the Family Guy episode aired with the image of Mohammed intact.

Except it didn't. Right when they were about to show Mohammed, the screen cuts to black title cards that read, "In this shot, Mohammed hands a football helmet to Family Guy; Comedy Central has refused to broadcast an image of Mohammed on their network." It's a great joke: Stone and Parker taking a swipe at Comedy Central, making a rather loud comment about the previous censoring of a another "religiously volatile" episode. (For that statement to work, you have to accept Scientology as a "religion.")

But, it wasn't a joke. In an ironic twist, Comedy Central actually censored the image of Mohammed that Stone and Parker inserted into the episode. It's funny when a joke emulates real life, but no so funny the other way.

"What's the big deal," you ask? For some Muslims, it's considered sacrilege to depict Mohammed. Making fun of him could be punishable by death. (For those of you wondering what Mohammed looks like, he's the chap pictured at the top of this post. I'm expecting WMDs to rain down on me any minute now.) I'm assuming that Comedy Central, much like on the episode, feared some sort of terrorist retaliation for depicting the Islamic holiest of holies.

What's completely fucked up about this whole thing is what they didn't censor. On the episode, after Family Guy airs, the terrorists immediately retaliated with their own "inflammatory" cartoon. It, of course, features Jesus, President Bush, and other decadent Americans involved in a scatological fun fest. It's a no-go to show Mohammed holding a football helmet, but just fine to show Jesus and the President shitting on the American flag. (It's a sad state when that 30 second segment is funnier than four seasons worth of Family Guy episodes, but, that's the way it is.) Why don't we get our priorities straight? I'm willing to bet there are more people upset by the depictions of Jesus and the President than would have been by a depiction of Mohammed. I, honestly, could give a fuck-all (because these things don't bother me), but, if you're going to be censoring assholes, you might as well go all the way, and not half-asshole it; something about the goose and the gander comes to mind.

I guess we can forget about ever seeing the "Trapped in the Closet" episode again. If they'll censor the rather innocuous "Cartoon Wars," there's no fucking way we'll ever see "Closet" and its Scientology bashing again. Those are some religious extremists you don't want to piss off.