Last year, a week after the Sandusky scandal first blasted through the media, South Park aired an episode parodying it. Although the episode’s storyline followed Kenny and Cartman through their experience in a foster home, the writers sprinkled jokes and references to Penn State (and its showers).
While this might have been an example of bad kairos (some might say it was too soon), I think South Park got the timing right on. The creators have a unique opportunity to quickly comment on current events because they write, animate, and air their shows all within one week. This allows them to comment on situations contemporaneously. While some people get worked up about people cracking jokes “too soon,” I think it’s important to be able to critically examine a situation even if it’s slightly offensive.
While South Park does make jokes, they also make extremely blunt and real observations. When the Dutch Mohammad comics were a huge issue, South Park tried to do an episode about a Family Guy episode that had a cartoon version of the prophet Mohammad. However, Comedy Central didn’t let them air the actual image of Mohammad, so the creators made the ending President Bush and Jesus Christ literally shitting all over the screen. They clearly pointed out the irony that we can’t broadcast a normal image of a Muslim prophet while we can display our President and a Christian prophet in an extremely crude and offensive manner.
I think it’s important to quickly and bluntly address an issue regardless of its inappropriateness or sensitivity. While it might offend people, it forces people to realize the actual situation much more quickly. Yes, it is very shameful to Penn State that we allowed Sandusky to somehow get around any consequences for his actions for so long, but just because we feel bad doesn’t mean we can avoid the guilt or shame. It was bad, and it happened, and we need to accept that.
South Park may have bad kairos in the sense that its shows often offend people, but its kairos is fantastic in the sense that it gets people to truly realize the full meaning of current events.
I think South Park’s insensitivity is totally fine, because that is the nature of the show. I don’t think such insensitivity is excusable in every show though. The fact of the matter is that some jokes are actually offensive. Only TV shows whose goal is to offend as many people as possible can get away with making jokes “too soon.” I believe we’re a hypersensitive society, but some things do cross a line. Some jokes are actually made too soon. However, South Park’s viewership has come to expect such explicit and blunt jokes, and so the show can get away with them.
I’m probably one of the only people in the world that doesn’t watch South Park. I never have, and I probably never will with the amount of free time that I (don’t) have. I know that sometimes people find it amusing to make fun of current events through humor. I watch Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert all the time, and they do just that. I do think that some things go too far, though. If I made cartoons for a living, I’d probably avoid these issues. I also probably wouldn’t have so many issues with the exact PSU example you’re discussing if I was not a Penn State student. I guess you can’t really have too much humor without offending somebody. Actually, that’s one of my quasi-scientific relationships that my roommate and I have come up with: “The amount of fun you have is directly proportional to the number of people that you offend.”