South Park Season Finale

[MysterionMuffles]

Did anybody catch the season finale last night? It was about how photoshop was causing self image issues amongst girls. At the beginning of the episode, cheerleaders are rehearsing their routine and at the end of it they each announce their names. When it comes to the fat and ugly girl Lisa Burger, she says her name with a complete lack of confidence, and then Wendy Testaburger (wow they love burgers for female last names I wonder why lol) defends her from the other girls who are upset that she ruined the flow. Wendy encourages Lisa to have more confidence and suggests that she should ask Butters out on a date. 

 

It was a pretty cute scene that this awkward fat girl with crooked teeth and glasses, and pants raised up to her chest nervously asking out a boy. He kindly declines and says he's thankful for her interest, but then has to add "I'm sorry but you're too fat for me."

 

When Wendy finds out about this incident, she snaps at him, and goes on this rampage basically trying to get people to see the fallacy of being shallow. Especially since Butters said he'd prefer a woman to be uber hot and takes care of her self like Kim Kardashian (who they rip on for the rest of the episode for being a hobbit photoshopped to look good). So Wendy takes the liberty of showing Butters how photoshop just creates a fantasy, and photoshops Lisa Burger right in front of him, showing how attractive she CAN look with photoshop magic, and all of a sudden, Butters wants to ask her out and fall in love with her.

 

Another boy ends up dating Lisa, and with Lisa on his arm, Clyde goes around the school hallways showing the boys the photoshopped image of her on his phone instead of the real her, which I thought was hilarious especially that she didn't mind. Because hey, she's gotten attention now right? Anyways, Wendy gets pissed off and accidentally rants out loud about how the boys only revere Lisa now because of that fake image of her, and yells out that in reality she's fat and ugly. Lisa is in earshot during Wendy's rant and basically for the rest of the episode, Wendy is accused of simply being jealous and having her own self image issues, even though she's like the biggest feminist in the school.

 

I thought it was an interesting episode, especially since they kept most of the action in the school. I like the up close and personal episodes of South Park, as opposed to the grander scale ones. They're simpler to digest and relate to and this one was a great break after all the Black Friday madness, which is also worthy of discussion in terms of how consumerism has consumed the American consumer as to have such violent mobs break into malls for Black Friday.

 

But this episode in particular about female self image...I'm just really moved by it. Photoshop HAS ruined self confidence in women even though the women who are photoshopped aren't initially all that attractive until the work is done onto them. I know there are some who are already beautiful despite the blemishes and photoshop turns them into an unrecognizable alien, but for the norm of photoshopped women, they're usually over worked on. Also, the fact that Wendy was getting shat on everywhere she went as being jealous, it speaks volumes as to how any woman who wants to speak out against photoshop, she is instantly labelled as jealous or full of herself. And I think that is designed to enable the continual degrading process of breaking a female's natural confidence.

 

 

[Wuzzums]

South Park has always been good at having a go at both sides pointing out the fallacies in their arguments. Wendy was attacking Butters for being shallow because he wouldn't date an objectively ugly girl, then she was attacking people for dating objectively ugly girls because they were perceived subjectively as beautiful. 

 

I find women to be more to blame for their low self-confidence than men. How much time does a woman spend on make-up, hair, nails, jewelry, fashion, cosmetics, etc? And how many times did you see a guy compliment a woman on those things? At best she's lucky if her boyfriend even notices the color of her hair changed. I have never heard of a guy say "what I mostly find attractive in a woman is well kept nails". And they're incredibly cruel with each other. This one time I was with a group of friends, and 2 of the women were berating this handsome guy for being in love with a less attractive female. And their arguments were only limited to looks.

 

I think it's because women constantly compare themselves to others. If a guy says he likes some trait (not necessarily limited to appearance) in a woman and the woman he's talking to doesn't have said trait then he's mostly likely gonna get attacked and accused of being shallow, living in a dream world, having unrealistic expectations, being out of his league, etc. They take it as if it was a personal insult.

[Pepin]

I seem to have gotten quite a different message. The wonder of the modern age is the ability to shape yourself into the persona of who you want to be, and people would prefer to look at who you want to be as opposed to who you are. As opposed to accepting yourself the way you are, changing the opinions of others in how they relate to you through your self image has real positive consequences, as can be shown in the episode by the girls being seen as having higher worth due to their protected selves as opposed to their actual selves. When Wendy points out the physical reality, it isn't that people deny the facts, it is rather that everyone would prefer to believe in eachothers' image.

 

Kayne is established as a character who is almost entirely ingrained in image, so much to the point where he doesn't realize Kim is a hobbit, and the effect it has on him his great. In the end, Kayne tells a tale about having to accept Kate for who she is, a hobbit, but till has a preference to believe in the unreality. Kayne essentially represents an exaggeration of the claims people like Wendy make. All other characters in the show provide the counterbalance to this in that they know that it is manufactured as illustrated by Stan asking Wendy to photoshop herself, they aren't lost in this unreality, but that they don't have a problem with it.

 

Of course the theme described by the two posts above me is present, but I think this counter theme is certainly present. It is something that South Park really excels in. On the other hand, I might be completely insane and picking up anthills off a piece of paper.

[MysterionMuffles]

Wow Pepin thanks for that alternate perspective. I didn't see it that way, of course it runs deeper. There's always a surface message that IS deep no doubt, but here's to the awesome capacity of a philosopher to go even deeper.

 

Yeah the thing with Stan, I thought when he was going up to Wendy in that scene, that he was gonna share how jaded he feels in playing a part in the shallowness game, except he has an emotional desparation TO play into that game and get her to update her image.

 

Still that ending...just heartbreaking. She betrayed her principles in order to conform and feel accepted. Kinda sad.

[Jami]

I haven't seen the finale episode, so shhhhhhhhhhhh!