Comedy Central too afraid to stand behind South Park
The two-episode “South Park” story in observance of the show’s 200th episode clarified a stance showrunners Trey Parker and Matt Stone have held since episode one.
“We will make fun of anybody and everybody because that is our right, and you can not scare us out of it.”
Comedy Central has been a bastion for free speech and commentary for 13 years and has garnered a huge following for doing so. Still, producers seem unwilling to stand behind their star program when push comes to shove.
As Comedy Central confirmed to Foxnews.com, in the episode “201,” the second part of the story has been censored. The episode brings back a number of the characters and situations “South Park” has mocked before, including the Muslim prophet Muhammad, who is depicted as wearing a bear suit.
Comedy Central had all depictions of Muhammad in the episode censored and bleeped every utterance of his name.
The decision came in reaction to a Web post by Abu Talhah al Amrikee, who claims his post was not a threat but meant to make the creators aware of the potential of violence.
“We have to warn Matt and Trey that what they are doing is stupid and they will probably wind up like Theo Van Gogh for airing this show,” al Amrikee said in the post. “This is not a threat, but a warning of the reality of what will likely happen to them.”
Al Amrikee told Fox News the post was meant to “explain the severity” of making a mockery of the Muslim prophet. Dutch filmmaker Van Gogh, the maker of the documentary “Submission,” about violence against women in the Muslim world, was murdered in 2004.
This is not the first time “South Park” has mocked Muhammad.
He appeared, uncensored, as a member of the “Super Best Friends” in Season Five of the show, and was censored during the Season 10 “Cartoon Wars” episodes.
The decision to censor the episode after the show had dealt with the subject matter before without retribution shows weakness on the part of Comedy Central.
“In the 14 years we’ve been doing South Park we have never done a show that we couldn’t stand behind,” said Parker and Stone in a joint statement on Southparkstudios.com. “We delivered our version of the show to Comedy Central and they made a determination to alter the episode.”
Without Parker or Stone ever writing it into the script, Comedy Central made itself the butt of a joke about free speech and expression.
I just wish this particular comedy-oriented television channel would have a better sense of humor about it.
