I Heart Southpark

OP-ED columnist and stauch left wing liberal, Frank Rich, makes a few interesting points in todays NY Times. His focus is fueled by the recent release of a book "South Park Conservatives: The Revolt Against Liberal Media Bias," by Brian C. Anderson

Among their anarchic comic skills, Mr.Parker and Mr Stone,
have a perfect pitch for lampooning what many Americans find most
irritating about liberals,especially Hollywood liberals, a self righteous
propensity for knowing better than any one else and for meddling in everyone's
business, whether by enforcing PC speech codes, or plotting to curb SUVs and
guns.

So far, so right!

He then talks about a March 30th episode of Southpark, in which Matt and Trey

true to their butt-out libertarianism, aimed their fire at self-righteous, big-government conservatives who have become every bit as high-handed and meddlesome as any Prius-pushing movie star

So far, still right.

Such is this role reversal that the same TV show celebrated by Mr. Anderson and his cohort as the leading edge of a potential conservative victory in the culture wars now looks like a harbinger of an anti-conservative backlash instead.

OPPPS!!!No longer right!

Trey and Matt have a long history of aiming their fire at both LIBERALS AND CONSERVATIVES.

Frank Rich is trying to imply that the "recent" acceptance of Southpark by conservatives is an attempt to become hip, and to embrace a cultural war victory over liberals.He uses that as the basis for drawing the erroneous conclusion that this one episode is an example of how conservatives, who he finds to be arrogant (the pot calling the kettle black)are now getting a big slap in their cultural face.

That is simply not true NOR is his belief that the cultural acceptance of Southpark by SOME conservatives (mostly campus students) is an attempt by the right at being "hip".

Maybe he should read Mr Anderson's book before using it as the basis for his erroneous hypothesis and conclusions!

As I wrote previously, the book is less about South Park and more about how the intellectual exhaustion of the left, along with other factors such as excessive political correctness, ,talk radio, Fox News, and bloggers have shaped the new conservatives, impacted on politics, and helped the Right to achieve parity in the cultural war.

In referencing the March 30th episode of Southpark, which hits at the Bush Administration's decision to intervene in the Schiavo case, Frank Rich goes onto say

" But what's given the Schiavo case resonance beyond the Schiavo story itself is that it crystallized the bigger picture of Olympian arrogance and illiberalism on the right. The impulse that led conservatives to intervene in a family's bitter debate over a feeding tube is the same one that makes them turn a debate over a Senate rule on filibusters into a litmus test of spiritual correctness. Surely no holier-than-thou Hollywood pontificator could be harder to take than the sanctimonious Bill Frist, who, unlike Barbra Streisand, can't even sing".

I tend to agree with him here -Bill Frist is sanctimonious and can't sing.
But here's where I have to wonder what Frank's point is:

"A USA Today poll a week later found that Americans by 55 to 40 percent believe that "Republicans, traditionally the party of limited government, are 'trying to use the federal government to interfere with the private lives of most Americans' on moral values".

USA TODAY!! A LIBERAL LEFT WING BIASED paper conducts a poll of its largely left wing liberal readers and he doesnt seem to wonder IF those "results" are skewed??

What IS Frank's point? That left wing liberals feel this way? This is a new revelation? A change in the way they used to feel?? Gee imagine that...left wing liberals who feel Republicans are trying to impose their moral values on them!! Next thing you know he will reveal is that water is wet and wrestling is fixed!

Then he tries to bring home his point, whatever the hell it may be, with this next statement

"No wonder another recent poll, from the Pew Research Center, finds that for all the real American displeasure with coarse entertainment, a plurality of 48 percent believes that "the government's imposing undue restrictions" on pop culture is "a greater danger" to the country than the entertainment industry itself. Who could have imagined that the public would fear Focus on the Family's James Dobson more than 50 Cent? "

48% of Americans (the same number give or take a percentage,who are left wing liberals that voted for Kerry) feel this way.
How is any of this information "new" and what is your point Frank??
That the country is culturally divided??? DUHHH!!!! We knew that already!

I do have to admit, however, that while I am the biggest critic of Hollywood, and know first hand that as an industry it imposes its left wing morality on the world, and due to some collective synapic misfire, insists it represents the "mainstream" and "the enlightened" I adamantly believe that undue restrictions on pop culture poses a great danger!

Some of the greatest literature and art of the 20th C. came out of Paris, in the 20's, during a time of great moral restraint in the US. At that time, Paris was the cultural mecca of literature, music, art, brewing in a cauldron of sex, booze and drugs. Culture and life itself burned brightly in the The City of Light.

It was the centre of modernity and artistic creativity - independence was encouraged and it revolutionized art literature and music. Prostitution was legal and the brothal culture was rich and flourished, even inspiring Salvador Dali who spent a few hours at 12 Rue Chambonne near the National Library of France. There was even a brothal that catered to priests; Religion simply closed its eyes in this legendary sin city!

The cafes of Montparnase, a magnet for artists, musicians, and writers, attracted Picasso Chagall Hemmingway Joyce Fitzgerald who shared ideas, lovers, and money.

"I shall never know again such freedom, lightheartedness and comradeship", sighed Hemingway. Paris was indeed "A Moveable Feast".

In this culture of freedom flamed by a tolerance that allowed eroticism to flourish openly, so many artists came together in one place for a brief time.

These creative geniuses of the 20th century, would transform the worlds of art, literature and music, all while living in a Paris, the city of tolerance and sexual freedom.

Art has for the most part been liberal and left of center, and that should never change. The more closed our society becomes, the more liberal becomes the backlash, using art( be it poetry, painting, sculpture, theatre, tv, music, film ) as its loudest voice.

We have spent three years liberating both Afghanistan and Iraq, providing their citizens with the opportunity and freedom to express themselves in music, art, and literature, without fear of gov't intervention and reprisals.

Hollywood is an art community; its product is art, even though the medium is film and television instead of paint brush, canvas, or the printed word.

So, what kind of shining example of freedom would imposing undue restrictions on Hollywood be to the rest of the world?

If you ask me, as a Southpark Conservative, why I love the show, I'd say its because Matt and Trey target everyone and everything regardless of religion, political affiliation, or cultural sensibilities. They are social commentators who voice their thoughts honestly and openly through their alter egos in Southpark, and they are prolifically in tune with the zeitgeist, at any given time, on any given issue.

I do not support or agree with Ted Steven's proposal that cable and satelite be policed by the federal government along with broadcast television. Cable is NOT available to everyone, only those who CHOOSE to pay for it, so the "protecting the public from liberal morality " argument is invalid. CHOICE is fundamental in a democratic nation. And while someone may find The Sopranos or Sex and The City offensive, I do not, and I sure as hell do NOT want ANYONE denying me the right to make that viewing choice, by eliminating or mitigating the opportunity for those shows, art forms in their own right, to be created.

There is definately a need for Hollywood to create art that represents many different voices, politically, sexually, culturally, religiously, and NOT to impose a liberal POV in those areas while denying a positive conservative voice, the right to also be expressed.

There is a bigger need for Hollywood and Hollywood celebs to stop lying, denying and deluding themselves into believing and then insisting that their left wing morality, opinions, attitudes, and politics represent the mainstream and are the purview of the truly enlightened.
As someone who is enlightened, and worked in Hollywood, THAT offends ME!

Hollywood considers its product "art" and wants the freedoms afforded to "art" yet it insists on imposing itself as a moral authority, and a mainstream moral authority at that, which is simply not true.

Art has always been LEFT of center, NOT THE center and the Hollywood elite need to remember that. They cannot have it both ways.

If they want the "left of center" freedoms that come from being "art" then they cannnot presume to be "the center". The Hollywood elites MUST stop imposing their own "censorious jihad" and denying a fair voice to those that think differently, and lean conservatively, especially while accusing Republicans and Conservatives of doing the same.