Wonder why the PC police haven't focused on Family Guy

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OliveOilMom
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29 Jan 2015, 11:05 pm

I love Family Guy. It's one of the few cartoons that I like. King of the Hill is the other one. Anyway, if you have ever seen Family Guy you'll know that they are so far from PC. I'm glad they aren't starting up a bunch of crap and having it taken off the air, but I wonder why they don't go over the top about it. The show makes fun of everything, I'm sure it's "triggering" for anybody who has a "trigger" of any sort.

So, how does this escape their wrath while silly stuff like the GoDaddy commercial doesn't?


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30 Jan 2015, 12:04 am

OliveOilMom wrote:
I love Family Guy. It's one of the few cartoons that I like. King of the Hill is the other one. Anyway, if you have ever seen Family Guy you'll know that they are so far from PC. I'm glad they aren't starting up a bunch of crap and having it taken off the air, but I wonder why they don't go over the top about it. The show makes fun of everything, I'm sure it's "triggering" for anybody who has a "trigger" of any sort.

So, how does this escape their wrath while silly stuff like the GoDaddy commercial doesn't?

Well? South Park isnt PC and the PC police havent messed with them either, maybe because they are afraid of both Family Guy and South Park making fun of the PC police?


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naturalplastic
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30 Jan 2015, 2:34 am

The OP answered the question herself: they attack everybody- not just one group-so it evens out. So nobody can really complain about the series the way they can complain about a short spot that just makes fun of one thing. And also -they might make fun of the PC police themselves-thats also a factor.



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30 Jan 2015, 3:37 am

AspieOtaku wrote:
OliveOilMom wrote:
I love Family Guy. It's one of the few cartoons that I like. King of the Hill is the other one. Anyway, if you have ever seen Family Guy you'll know that they are so far from PC. I'm glad they aren't starting up a bunch of crap and having it taken off the air, but I wonder why they don't go over the top about it. The show makes fun of everything, I'm sure it's "triggering" for anybody who has a "trigger" of any sort.

So, how does this escape their wrath while silly stuff like the GoDaddy commercial doesn't?

Well? South Park isnt PC and the PC police havent messed with them either, maybe because they are afraid of both Family Guy and South Park making fun of the PC police?


Firstly, I have no idea what either of you are talking about since both shows have been a constant target of controversy from both the right and left sides of the political spectrum. Wikipedia even has extensive articles solely about the criticism they've endured: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Family_Guy and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Park_controversies . And being a Tumblr user, believe me, Seth MacFarlane is definitely not viewed in a positive light by the so-called "social justice warriors".

'South Park' is much better-received, though, because it's satire; the entire premise of the show - especially as of the last few years - is rooted entirely in political and social commentary. It's an intelligent show (IMHO) which aims to present a moderate and somewhat apolitical deconstruction of current issues, albeit through its own brand of crude humor. Satire doesn't lend itself easily to legitimate controversy: similarly, if you get mad at a joke in 'The Onion' or 'The Daily Show', odds are you're missing the point.

'Family Guy', on the other hand, is simply a sitcom. The "edginess" of the humor serves no satirical or subversive purpose, it's just crude and mean-spirited for the sake of shock. It also has a blatant and heavy-handed political agenda (which is usually ideologically flawed or presented poorly). Whereas 'South Park' tackles serious issues with a degree of respect, 'Family Guy' again relies on blunt, purposeless shock, and usually either trivializes, belittles or misrepresents the topics they're covering (e.g., from my own perspective, for a show that claims to be pro-equality, it's one of the most homophobic shows on mainstream television). The early seasons were enjoyable as light-hearted entertainment, but what 'Family Guy' has become is just cruel and misanthropic. Provided, I can't stand mean-spirited humor, so I'm definitely biased against it, but even from an objective standpoint, I just don't think it's all that good a show, or at least not as good as it used to be prior to its revival.

And yet, I do really enjoy 'American Dad!'. Sometimes it falls victim to the same issues as 'Family Guy', but there's just a much better team of writers behind it, plus 'AD!''s showrunners were the same ones behind the first couple seasons of 'FG'.



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30 Jan 2015, 4:15 am

It's kind of silly that Family Guy still sparks so much controversy from the religious right and politically correct leftists. The episode structures have been stale and repetitive for several years. It's like they have 5 different episode templates they work with and then they just color them in with different details.



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30 Jan 2015, 6:24 am

Family Guy can't be censored without killing it. The Manatees get sick and die if even a single idea ball is removed from their tank.



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30 Jan 2015, 7:08 am

Cartoons used to be for kids, and occasionally had an adult subtext.
But then came The Simpsons. When they first arrived, children were banned from watching it.
Cartoon creators suddenly had a new mode - overt social commentary.

Then came Ren and Stimpy, Itchy and Scratchy, Cat-Dog, Beavis and Butthead, South Park and others.
Each upped the anti in one way or another.
Imagine the next step. It will make Family Guy look tame, like The Simpsons now does.

Or.... maybe they'll go back to Toy Story and Wall-E.


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30 Jan 2015, 7:11 am

Because it's Satire.


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30 Jan 2015, 8:45 am

Fnord wrote:
Because it's Satire.


I understand that, but the PC police have no sense of humor and also no sense of perspective. If it seems offensive, it is and must be stopped. If you aren't offended by it then you are guilty of whatever ism they can think up. Before long they will come up with a new thing to accuse us with, "hate think".


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30 Jan 2015, 8:57 am

Then maybe it's because Family Guy is so famous for being offensive that even Captain Obvious would look foolish pointing it out.


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30 Jan 2015, 10:48 am

Thier dog used to be a moderator here.
Image


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30 Jan 2015, 11:00 am

Good satire that lampoons society effectively across the board will generally be left alone. However, if the bias is more left or right, you'll hear more outcry from the offended side.


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30 Jan 2015, 11:33 am

Narrator wrote:
Cartoons used to be for kids, and occasionally had an adult subtext.
But then came The Simpsons. When they first arrived, children were banned from watching it.
Cartoon creators suddenly had a new mode - overt social commentary.

Then came Ren and Stimpy, Itchy and Scratchy, Cat-Dog, Beavis and Butthead, South Park and others.
Each upped the anti in one way or another.
Imagine the next step. It will make Family Guy look tame, like The Simpsons now does.

Or.... maybe they'll go back to Toy Story and Wall-E.


Well, firstly, 'Itchy & Scratchy' was not its own show but rather a show-within-a-show in 'The Simpsons' which satirized cartoon violence, but mainly there's a biiig difference between "social commentary" and puerile shock humor.

'South Park' and 'Family Guy' did indeed open the doors to another generation of adult animation; surely you remember the pure excess of short-lived primetime animated series which started pouring out after the late 1990s. Many of them tried to out-do 'South Park' in terms of explicit crudeness, but that's pretty much all that they tried to do. So many failed animated series came along over the last few years boasting about how "politically incorrect" but still completely sucking as shows. 'South Park''s longevity can be attributed to the fact that it's simply a well-written show regardless of raunchy jokes, while the short life spans and severe critical lashings of something like 'Allen Gregory' (possibly the worst primetime animated show I can recall) can be attributed to the fact that it was only raunchy jokes to begin with.

Look at some of the most popular animated series on TV right now, with all ages: 'Adventure Time', 'Bob's Burgers', 'Regular Show', 'Gravity Falls'...even more expressly adult series like 'Rick & Morty', 'The Venture Bros.' and 'Archer' are tame compared to the crudeness of 'Family Guy', and they're on cable networks. Plus there's still a lot of nostalgia for shows like 'Mission Hill' and 'Futurama'. People make a big fuss about the declining moral quality of television, but if anything, the aforementioned shows prove that good writing and good characters are always going to be far more important with people than how dirty the jokes are.



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30 Jan 2015, 11:51 am

OliveOilMom wrote:
I love Family Guy. It's one of the few cartoons that I like. King of the Hill is the other one. Anyway, if you have ever seen Family Guy you'll know that they are so far from PC. I'm glad they aren't starting up a bunch of crap and having it taken off the air, but I wonder why they don't go over the top about it. The show makes fun of everything, I'm sure it's "triggering" for anybody who has a "trigger" of any sort.

So, how does this escape their wrath while silly stuff like the GoDaddy commercial doesn't?



Already noted by Skibz88 but I'll include the quote from his link. They did start up a bunch of crap and try to have it taken off the air. That they failed doesn't mean they didn't direct wrath at it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criticism_of_Family_Guy

Quote:
The Parents Television Council, a conservative non-profit watchdog[4] group, has published critical views of Family Guy.[5][6][7][8] In May 2000, in its weekly "E-Alert" email newsletter, the PTC launched a letter-writing campaign to the Fox network to persuade the network to cancel Family Guy following a return from a long hiatus in the show's second season, due to what the PTC claimed were "strong advertiser resistance and low ratings".[9]


Naturally the PTC were not upset about "strong advertiser resistance and low ratings", that was just their bait for FOX. They were upset because....
Quote:
Family Guy made the PTC's 2000,[10] 2005,[11] and 2006[12] lists of "worst prime-time shows for family viewing", with over forty Family Guy episodes having been chosen as "Worst TV Show[s] of the Week" for reasons of profanity, animated nudity and violence.


They have repeatedly complained to the FCC but the FCC said....

Quote:
"that because of the absence of explicit or graphic descriptions or depictions of any sexual organ, along with the absence of shocking, pandering, and/or titillating effect, the episode ... is not patently offensive."
(quote from the FCC)

so it's not for lack of trying on their part



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30 Jan 2015, 1:34 pm

I admit to watching both shows. I see South Park as making some very astute political points. I see Family Guy as not really having much of a point. It's hard to really be offended by it because it is just so dumb and stupid. But there are some good jokes mixed in here and there so I watch it.

I don't like all the rape jokes related to Quagmire. How he's always talking about raping unconscious women. I have to wonder what is the writer's point? I have to assume that there is none other than to be offensive for the sake of being offensive. I would like to see an interview with Seth Rogen where he explains it or tries to defend it. To me it's just lazy writing when the best you can do is make fun of rape without attempting to convey any sort of ethical understanding of the situation. Just my opinion.



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30 Jan 2015, 4:42 pm

What's so wrong about making jokes about raping women? I mean, few people complain if you make jokes about raping men...