Family Guy' Mocks Sarah Palin's Son Trig For Having Down Syndrome - Page 4

[MTVMANN]

Posted: 2/20/10 at 4:32pm

And that his mother is Sarah Palin...who is not able to give him the full attention that any child needs.

That said, I'm sure she can give him more attention that the Duggers can!

[Plum]

Posted: 2/21/10 at 4:31am

Wow, it's taken this long for people to realize that this show is a hateful piece of ****?

(And I don't say that lightly about a program with so many musical numbers, trust me.)


But you know what? Even though I've had Family Guy inflicted on me often enough to never, ever want to see it on my own, I wanted to have the facts, so I watched the whole episode.

It somehow managed to be even less funny than the usual tripe (calling Truman "FDR's ass-bitch" is a history joke now?), but I wasn't really offended until Stewie started singing about "Down Syndrome Girl" and all her Down-related facial features. Classy! Next time maybe he can have a song about "Black Girl" and her big lips, flat nose, and shiny white teeth.

Satire is humor as a weapon, used to attack...well, as our former President would have put it, the evil things of the world.

Peter groping the missing man's wife in the last scene wasn't satire because it wasn't being used to tear down Peter or the way fake psychics take advantage of people. It was just laughing at the spectacle of a woman in distress being taken advantage of. (But hey, it wouldn't be an episode of Family Guy without a joke about female victimization.)

Stewie singing about "cat eyes" didn't tear down Stewie or bad attitudes about Down Syndrome, and if that was aimed at Sarah Palin* it missed its target by about a mile. It was just...a really unfunny song that listed off Down-associated traits in yet another smug, pathetic Family Guy attempt to be edgy.

*If they'd actually mocked her they'd have finally succeeded at the whole "satire" thing by picking on the powerful and evil and harmfully stupid rather than people who are already downtrodden enough. But they didn't mock her at all! One oblique reference to the former governor of Alaska is nothing, so if they were trying to make some point about Trig, count that as one more thing they fail utterly at.

Family Guy is not satire. It's self-satisfied Seth McFarlane & co. excusing their sexism and lazy stereotyping humor by claiming they're performing some great social service. What a load of bull****. And sadly, this is hardly the most offensive thing I've seen on that crap show. *throws up hands* Add it to the list.




Updated On: 2/21/10 at 04:31 AM

[winston89]

Posted: 2/21/10 at 5:30am

Plum,

I think you missed the point dude.

Humor for the longest time has often be at the expense of others. I just think that people have lost focus of that due to this major PC age that we live in that it is almost at a point where that can't happen anymore. If Abbot and Costello or Laurel and Hardy were around performing in today's world, people would be upset due to the fact that people are getting humorous pleasure out of someone who is fat and that being obese is a major problem in this country.

Furthermore, I do think that George Carlin was right. He did a routine where he talked about how he felt that you can joke about anything. That all that mattered was how the joke was constructed. He talked about how every joke needs something that is way out of line and that something that is way out of line is the thing that people laugh at.

People weren't laughing at the fact that Stewie was mentioning all those things about someone with Down Syndrome. People were laughing due to the fact that they couldn't believe that he would actually do a Broadway style song about DS. The fact that he did it in song was what made the whole thing funny. People weren't laughing at DS or the show's writers weren't trying to find humor in DS but they were finding humor in one of the characters singing about it. There is a difference.

I don't think that this many people got up in arms when Peter was part of a barber shop quartet that did a song that broke the news to a man in a hospital bed that he has AIDS. I think that the only reason why people are upset is because of the Palin line and because it got her upset and she bitched and moaned about it.

[Plum]

Posted: 2/21/10 at 7:06am

Where did I say that humor shouldn't be at anyone else's expense? I'm saying that the "satire" excuse as used by Family Guy is tired, inaccurate, and intellectually lazy.

And yeah, anything can be the subject of humor - especially parody, which unlike satire is essentially affectionate - but when you're getting into territory like sexual assault or Down syndrome you'd better damn well watch what you're doing because the people involved here are real and they have enough crap in their lives without some privileged white boy douche writing a cartoon adding to it.

I swear, a good chunk of the time when they're making their little pop culture parody asides they're like, "You know what would make this funnier? Rape!" Freaking hilarious. You can say that Peter's lecherous opportunism was being mocked in the groping scene, but if it was, it was parody, not satire. Peter comes back next episode as a protagonist, the slate erased. Oh, that crazy guy, taking sexual advantage of someone looking to him for help! Hee hee it's just a cartoon so it's funny!

Like I said, Stewie's song was mild by Family Guy standards, and if it weren't for the fact that it was on Family Guy, I could almost, almost see the argument that the song isn't offensive. Almost.

And they probably just stuck in the "former governor of Alaska" line for attention, because they certainly weren't making any larger point with it. And that's the thing - when you use humor that wounds deeply, you'd better have a point, or you're just an asshole. If you're just doing it because "hehe groping a frightened woman is funny"...well, as my mother would say, "may your ass burn in hell."

And yeah, I know I risk looking completely humorless here, or worse yet (gasp!) the great shibboleth "politically correct". But I'd rather have someone accuse me of not getting a really bad joke than support moronically hurtful BS.

[tommyboy]

Posted: 2/21/10 at 7:23am

I think Seth was hoping that the word FORMER would have had a bigger impact than it did. And since after 4 pages of posts no one has brought it up, I will.

The key here is that Sarah has quit on her own people in order to become the face of the Republican party, and she is not doing a very good job of it.

My only hope is that she wins the Rep. nod for POTUS only to be defeated by the largest margin in US history.

P.S. to GWB -- NO! I don't miss you yet. (AND NEVER WILL!)

[romantico]

Posted: 2/21/10 at 7:32am

Its very simple. If you don't like the show or find it funny, then don't watch it. I, as do many others find it hilarious.I feel the same with South Park as well.For a show you label crap, you seem to know every episode and exactly everything that is offensive and hateful.It's like the minister who knows pornography when he see's it and has to buy every issue of Hustler and Penthouse and rent every X rated film so he can know exactly what he is dealing with.He find it disgusting and repulsive,but is doing his part for the community by researching and knowing what it is he criticizing.Oh,but he hates it though!!!

PUH-LEAZE! If you find it so offensive don't watch or change the channel.I am no fan or Rap or hip hop so I don't listen to it. Others can and I could care less. Am I concerned about the message or hate or violence some may stir up? Nope.I won't talk about the subject because I don't listen to it,just know it ain't my cup of tea.

[Plum]

Posted: 2/21/10 at 7:20pm

The "if you don't like it, don't watch" argument is such a classic derailing technique. Well done! But this isn't about me or my artistic TV preferences - a show can be **** without being hateful, and if it was just the former I'd shrug it off the way I shrug off...I dunno, Mercy or something. Family Guy just happens to be both.

That said, I assure you I don't watch that show. But when I'm at my parents' house one of my assorted siblings does watch it, all the time, loudly enough that if I want to eat, I'm going to hear it. And I guess I have zero patience for offensive speech being played off as "humor" that's just too "provocative" and "sophisticated" for the likes of me.

There's a definite dark thrill about making really sick jokes - I remember when I was about seven I took great delight in a book that was about the many different uses for a dead cat. But laughing about cat corpses being used as pencil sharpeners isn't perpetuating language or ideas that have historically been used to oppress cats, you know? There are ways and there are ways.

Family Guy never gives me that dark little thrill. Its jokes don't make me question what I find offensive and why. They just...sit there and smell bad, like a fart in a movie theater. Except sometimes I laugh at fart humor because I'm twelve.

And tommyboy, the episode made absolutely no political point at all, which is why nobody's brought it up. Saying "FORMER governor of Alaska" isn't a dig at all with no context. It was just a throwaway line stuck in there to get publicity for the show, because this is how they make their living and continue to tell themselves that they're cool - by poking a finger at a woman who makes her living off false outrage.

[TheatreDiva90016]

Posted: 2/21/10 at 7:36pm

"The "if you don't like it, don't watch" argument is such a classic derailing technique."

No. It's a fact.

Sorry Plum, but you seem to have a stick lodged somewhere because you don't like the show. We get it. You don't like the show's style of humer.

But ranting on and on about it is pointless.

[romantico]

Posted: 2/21/10 at 8:07pm

Well said TheatreDiva90016! If you don't like it,don't watch. In my opinion, it's a funny show and I laugh my butt off every time I watch it.What's funny to me may not be funny to you and vice versa. No right or wrong here.Just personal opinion and taste.

[SNAFU]

Posted: 2/21/10 at 10:35pm

I also find the show funny and love how Seth deliberately presses peoples buttons to get the knee jerk reactions.

[AbbaRabbit]

Posted: 2/21/10 at 10:47pm

i'm going to start making a list of every single group of people made fun of or stereotyped on family guy, starting with the two episodes on adult swim tonight. we're halfway through the first episode and so far:
sex offenders
physically disabled people
people with brain injuries
lesbians
black people
police officers
pregnant women
conjoined twins
drug addicts
fat people

edit:
amputees
blind people
homeless people
alcoholism
slavery
hearing impaired people
the elderly

Updated On: 2/21/10 at 10:47 PM

[ColorTheHours048]

Posted: 2/22/10 at 12:22am

Friedman's statement was a perfect response to the whole controversy. As tommyboy said, the joke was not a jab at Trig, but a jab at Sarah for being the former governor. Her response to the joke and her use of sympathy for her son's plight is, in my opinion, more offensive than any joke Family Guy could have made about such a delicate matter.

The woman is a fool. Plain and simple. Family Guy is a satire. Plain and simple. If you take the jokes seriously, you're reading way too much into it. Sure, the writers are absolutely 100% liberal-minded and it shows. But there is no harmful intent behind ANYTHING they do. Updated On: 2/23/10 at 12:22 AM

[romantico]

Posted: 2/22/10 at 6:01am

It all goes back to her excusing Rush Limbaugh for using the R word and dismissing it as Satire. When a fellow Conservative like Rush does it, it is OK. When a Democrat like Seth MacFarlane does it, its mean and cruel.As Bill Maher called her, she is the queen of fake outrage.