It never comes as a shock when South Park says or does something offensive.
The adult cartoon is well known for its hilarious, controversial, and often offensive humor, and this is what makes it so popular around the world.
It is probably impossible to count the number of times that the cartoon has offended someone or has made an extremely offensive joke. However, their most recent one is probably their most controversial.
They have poked fun and have completely roasted the transgender community by featuring a trans athlete in an episode.
Keep scrolling to learn more…
South Park is one of America’s most famous adult cartoons.
Created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone back in 1997, the show follows the misadventures of 4 potty-mouthed grade-schoolers in the dysfunctional town of South Park, Colorado.
They were in the same film class when attending the University of Colorado and both found the experience of standing on film sets extremely boring, so they would amuse one another by making silly voices.
In an interview with Entertainment Weekly, Parker said: “We would always talk like these little kids and make each other laugh.”
South Park is known for its DIY style…
Parker was inspired by his impressive cartoon debut at school about American history, in which he cut shapes out of paper and modeled them into characters. This would eventually be recreated and produced into animation for South Park.
This includes 5 Primetime Emmy Awards, a Peabody Award, an MTV Music Award, and has had numerous inclusions in various publications’ lists of greatest TV shows.
South Park is known to push the boundaries of what is, and what isn’t acceptable to be shown on TV. This includes the issues of gun laws here in America. This was mentioned during an episode in season nineteen, in which a character named PC Principle went on to tackle everything from gun rights to the gentrification of South Park.
The controversial nature of South Park has brought in complaints from around the world, ranging from concerned parents to celebrities, and world leaders.
“Band in China” has actually been banned from China completely, and so has the whole of South Park.
South Park no longer exists in China.
According to InkStone News, as of the 7th October, all reviews for any of South Park‘s twenty-three seasons have been removed from the popular Chinese review site, Douban.
Searches in both English and Chinese on the country’s version of Facebook will come back with no results.
But this certainly doesn’t make China the first country to hold a grudge against South Park and, let’s face it, it’s not exactly going to phase Parker and Stone now, is it?
The episode is titled Board Girls…
And it revolves around the character Strong Woman (who is also the vice principal at the elementary school and partner of PC Principal, with whom she has the PC babies) entering a Strongwoman Competition, which she previously won.
In the episode, she is asked by a sportscaster about how she feels about the trans woman competing alongside her, to which she responds, “I feel honored to be a part of history, I have a lot of incredible trans friends who are athletes, so we are all inspired that this woman is competing.”
So far, so good…
The sportscaster goes on to ask Strong Woman if she has met the trans athlete, Heather Swanson, and she replies with a no.
“She’s not exactly your average trans athlete,” the sportscaster then says.
And when she walks into the camera shot, the joke is clear.
Heather goes on to say, “I’m not here to talk about my transition, I’m here to kick some f****** a**,” and “I’m gonna roll up the other women here, and I’m gonna smoke ’em. I am the strongest woman this state has ever seen,” after being asked if it was true that she began identifying as a woman only 2 weeks ago.
The episode shows the other women competing against Heather, and it’s safe to say that they get completely crushed by her in the different games, such as wrestling and shotput.
In the end, Heather, who claimed to be unstoppable, is defeated by some of the elementary school girls who formed a board game club after the boys at the school complained and had them removed from their game club.
Heather says the competition against the girls was not fair because she was born a man, which means she does not read the board game directions beforehand like she says women do, so she was at a disadvantage. Cartman then invites Heather to join the boy’s club.
Because South Park is so popular…
There are many out there who found the episode funny and felt it was delivering an accurate message about the current debates about trans athletes.
McKinnon, who has made headlines recently in regards to her “unfair” abilities as a trans athlete, said on Twitter, “I’m not particularly mad about the South Park episode.”
“Yes, it’s transphobic. Yes, it’s lazy. Yes, it contributes to harm to trans women and girls. But they’re lazy and increasingly irrelevant. F***, Futurama made the same stupid storyline in 2003. Transphobes don’t have new jokes.”
It’s an extremely difficult situation.
The episode doesn’t necessarily mean that Parker and Stone are transphobic, and many have argued that the episode is proving a very valid issue that the sporting world is currently dealing with.
But it is clearly offensive to the transgender community, and it is never acceptable to make fun of somebody for the way they identify.