*VHS inserted into player*
[Intro Music]
South Park has come a long way since its days of construction paper and Elmer's glue.
And over the years, we've been able to see its growth from the profane to the profound.
This is Matt Stone and Trey Parker, the creators of South Park, as well as the two animated short films that preceded it.
Both titled, "The Spirit of Christmas."
The first, in 1992, featured four boys witnessing a fight between Frosty The Snowman and an infant Jesus.
And the second, in '95, featured a fully grown Jesus. This time battling Santa Claus.
A video that became one of their earliest pre-YouTube viral hits, after being passed around Hollywood by
formed Fox executive, Bryan Graden, who'd originally commissioned the video as a Christmas card.
And with the success with "The Sprit of Christmas," they were able to secure a six episode series deal
with Comedy Central, a dying network mostly known for showing reruns of "The Benny Hill Show,"
and "Absolutely Fabulous."
South Park was a foundational part in making it the basic cable giant it is today.
Debuting on August 13, 1997, with the episode "Cartman Gets an Anal Probe."
The only episode to be made with the stop motion cut out techniques of those first two short films.
The rest of the series was done in Maya using 3D animation, with the original construction paper textures
scanned in and plastered on the models.
It gave the series its signature style, setting it apart from its contemporaries, like "The Simpsons," or "Family Guy."
It made its perceived cheapness a virtue, and they didn't just create a show, they reworked the entire animation process,
putting a system into place that would allow them to produce content hours after it was written.
With an average turn around time of just six days, keeping the content fresh and topical.
A time capsule of the current week.
And while most satire pretty heavily focuses on just one side of an issue,
South Park tends to criticize every angle. Matt and Trey see the world for what it is, and present it as such.
They don't take sides and they have no agenda, but honesty and humor.
They don't just target conservatives,
they go after liberals and liberal positions.
Left, right and everything in-between.
T. Parker: "What we've always said and I think what we said with the show
is not anything new, but i think it is something that is great,
put out there, which is, you know,
The people screaming on this side
and the people screaming on that side
are the same people, and it's okay to be someone in the middle
laughing at both of 'em."
South Park set out to dismantle any symbol of self importance.
It isn't escapism.
It rubs out noses in the ugliness of our world...
...while simplifying current events into a less complicated, more easily understood format.
And viewed through the lense of these four kids, made it more relatable
to younger audiences,
but South Park debuted just as the newly formed TV parental guidelines went into effect.
The series being the first to earn the TV MA rating (mature audiences)
by the FCC.
And people typically like to point fingers at the FCC
when the topic of censorship comes up,
particularly with South Park.
But the FCC's authorizing legislation
doesn't allow to regulate subscription-based content,
that include cables, satellite and Pay- per-view services.
Those are all self-regulated under their own standards and practices department
which is why the rules are so vague and varied between networks.
Standards and practices only censored when pressured by advertisers.
You're less likely to secure an ad spot from Mc Donald's
when your content is labeled with profanity
which is also the basis for the de-monetization rule here on YouTube.
Advertisers tipically operate under the assumption that family-friendly content
is the biggest revenue source
but that's not always the case.
In fact, ad space on South Park has always been some of the network most valuable.
In the spring of '97, Comedy Central's highest selling
ad-spot went from just seventy-five hundred dollars
and after only a few months South Park being on the air,
those prime-time slots skyrocketed to the thirty thousands and more;
although in the 90's and early 2000's,
a lot of the material was only suggestive.
Matt and Tray were masters
of planting a joke in your head
"Okay and now for your enjoyment
here is my famous ping pong ball trick!"
and then, subverting it with a non-joke.
"There! I didn't miss one!"
These days the vulgarities are a little bit more...
blunt.
T. Parker: "If you go and look at Season 2 or Season 1, and it's so tame
It's like "Yo-Gabba-Gabba" by comparison to what we do now."
And even though the material was significantly tamer in those early seasons,
it still pushed the boundaries of what was acceptable on television quite a bit.
Take a look at the word "pussy"
Prof. Mackey: "Now, I know that some of you think this is very funny...
words like penis and vagina.
We're gonna get through this by being mature and grown-up, m'kay?"
People often credit Amy Schumer for getting the word
pussy uncensored on Comedy Central
but South Park was airing pussy in Central all the way back
in 1998
with the episode "Gnomes."
Cartman: "Yeah he called me a pussy! I'm not a pussy! You're a pussy!"
"You're a pussy, pussy!"
Or in 2001 with "Here comes the neighborhood"
And now we hear 50 year old ladies say it on CNN because it's topical.
"Today we saw him boasting, laughing
about grabbing a woman's pussy..."
Our cultural sensitivities to language have evolved.
There are been a lot of swear-words related innovations over the years
and South Park has really blazed the trail for social acceptability
and obscene content
like with the episode "It hits the fan"
which serves as a great lesson on the diminishing return of empty profanity
by having the characters speak and write the word "shit"
nearly 200 times,
stripping it of its potency.
In the episode you can really see the fluctuation
in the severity of swearing all the time
starting with Kyle saying:
"Goddamit Cartman! What they're gonna say on cock drama?"
"Goddamn" being one of television biggest taboo just a few decades ago
Cartman: "Tonight on cock-drama,
on TV they're gonna say
shit."
Shit being the center piece of the episode
as well as a word unable to be broadcast uncensored
before 1999.
Just two years before this episode aired.
And it's closed down with the censored:
"Holy [fucking] shit"
It's interesting to see where we are now in terms of language intolerance
and how far we still have to go.
South Park is not only the most aware
but also, one of the most important shows on television.
It really matures its audience through its own immaturity,
hoping to desensitize the mainstream, the vulgarity.
A common criticism of South Park lately is that it's lost its edge.
Yet, two weeks ago we saw a classroom of ten year-old boys
pull out their dicks and protest on basic cable
and it wasn't a big deal.
South Park hasn't softened, we as a society has just grown up.
In 1952, Lucille Ball was prohibited from using the word pregnant on television
because it was considered "indecent" and now, look where we got.
Our standards for what's offensive has radically changed
and maybe sometime in the future, we will do away with it altogether.
As you can see here, the number of FCC complains of the past decade and a half has decreased quite a bit.
That brief uptick in 2004 was the Janet Jackson's nipple incident broadcast during a Super Bowl.
And with South Park, there's definitely more leniency on visual obscenities than verbal ones.
For example, in the episode "Where Has My Country Gone?"
where the Canadian Donald Drumpf-equivalent is shown
being fucked to death by Mr. Garrison
but when the actor's referred to, by the Canadians,
"Hey, did you hear the news, buddy?!
The Canadian Prime Minister has been f***ed to death."
is bleeped.
And that has a lot to do with the crudeness of the animation and the uncanny valley.
South Park really just wants to step a move from stick figures
so they're able to get away with a lot more.
Depictions of sexual acts involving construction paper is pretty far removed from the actual thing
but the word "FUCK" is the same across the board.
But these words are only bad because we let them be.
Censorship is really just preserving the negativity of language.
The word "pregnancy" being deemed to vulgar to air, in retrospect
seems goofy and backwards as hell
but it didn't at the time.
And think how we'll look back at the word "CUNT" or "DICK".
Censorship does not protect children.
As a former child myself,
I can tell you that awareness overpowers ignorance.
Know about something without knowing what it's
and you'll be more compelled to investigate.
Censorship won't keep a child from swearing.
It only make them more curious,
which is the entire foundation of the show.
A perfect metaphor for what happens to children when their language is restricted.
Claiming that words by themselves somehow corrupt or degrade the people that use them,
it's not only ridiculous but it's also what gives shows like South Park,
a platform to be offensive by pushing those artificial boundaries.
With no boundaries, there's not one to offend
but that will probably make life a lot more boring and a lot less funny.
So I guess what that means dealing with censored "fucks" on television for the next decade or so,
it's probably worth it to see just how far South Park can push the envelope
within those limits.
Cartman: "So please, everyone, for now on
you got to try and watch your language."
"Go fuck yourself!"