Why I won’t be watching the Simpsons anymore
Bookworm on Nov 13 2006 at 8:36 am | Filed under: Hollywood, Military, Uncategorized
The Simpsons stopped being funny about a decade ago, so it’s no hardship to boycott the show. Even if it were screamingly funny, though, I’d still boycott it based on last night’s episode. I’d heard vague rumors about the episode — “The Simpsons takes on the Iraq War” — and have to admit to being curious. So, when it showed up on TiVo (TiVo’s decision, not mine), I watched.
It turned out the show wasn’t about the war at all (aside from a few snide references to recruiting problems because of the War), it was about the Army, and it made John Kerry look like the Army’s benevolent uncle. Watch The Simpsons and you will be assured that the Army is a primarily gay organization that preys upon the retarded and the suicidal, and that it is comprised of viciously amoral commanders who lust to take over American citizens. (Probably the show’s writers read this article, assuring us that the Army is made up of “misfits” — felons, dropouts, and other societal failures.)
Even Mr. Bookworm, who is no fan of the Iraq War, but does respect the Army, was disgusted. We agreed that the show deserved to be deleted. I’ll go one step further, as I said, and mentally delete The Simpsons from my list of available entertainment options.
By the way, getting back to the subject of the quality of enlistees. Frankly, I have no idea whether the Army is turning into San Quentin on the parade ground. I’ll go back to a point I made earlier, though, which is that the Army is itself a form of education. So those “dropouts” who found it pointless and painful to analyze the floral imagery in The Picture of Dorian Gray may be breakaway successes when given external discipline and surrounded by airplane engines.
One other thing is that, if one assumes for the sake of argument that everything bad about the enlistees is true, people with some antisocial energy often make for good troops. While the Duke of Wellington referred to his own troops as “the scum of the earth,” the fact is that these troops defeated the Napoleonic juggernaut. Thus, it’s fine for the rich and well-fed to be snide about the soldiers, but it’s the soldiers who get the job done — and they’re often a whole lot better, braver and more honorable than the well-heeled who are deriding them.
UPDATE: I’m not the only one whose had it with The Simpsons. Among others blogging, some with video clips, are:
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2 Responses to “Why I won’t be watching the Simpsons anymore”
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Even Mr. Bookworm
Even? Heh. Thanks for the blog posts, I’ve been reading a lot of stuff since the elections have created some new dynamics. Hungry for different perspectives, I am. Kept checking my favorites for new stuff.
If you have read Sala’s recent posts, You would know that peace time for armies of any kind, any disciplined fighting force for that matter, is a diaster for discipline and troop morale. Warriors join up for war, and while it is true that warriors don’t make up the majority of the American or military population, there are still enough to make their displeasure known. So when war does occur, and the Army is slotted to fight it, discipline will be much better and troop conditions will be much better, than if you are in the Navy’s position of peace time deployments.
There is only so much training you can get done, before the edge starts to wear off on the soldiers. If people are really worried about misfits and criminals in the Army, they should be shouting ontop of roof tops for more wars.
Aristocrats have oftentimes made great use of people they found useless, by sending them to die off in wars. Whether this was Britain with Australia, or the chickenhawk strategy of the Left, the aristocrats love getting rid of social deviants via war. It must gall them awefully to despise the military, yet not be allowed to send the military to their deaths for fear of losing power in America.
This comment from floppy is… uh telling.
I agree that the timing was in poor taste, but trying to make it seem like a direct insult to the troops is just silly. By the way, I don’t think it was great timing either. My dad fought in three wars. I think veterans day is to honor his sacrifice, not just steam over the crappiness of the Iraq war. The main event on veterans day is thanking veterans (even thanking them for unquestioningly fighting in stupid, dishonest wars that we lazily, unthinkingly send them off to while we stick a stupid sticker on our car and then forget about them).
While I agree with you that they could have aired on a different day, in the end, the right to make such a statement on any damn day one wants is what our guys have been sacrificing their lives for 200 years.
Lisa — November 13, 2006 @ 11:22 am
Why is it silly to think that it is a direct insult, is this not what the guys sacrificing their lives for 200 years have been fighting for, so that people can directly insult them from America to the front lines? Lisa says it wasn’t a direct insult, but that people died to give people the right. The right to what, insult the folks that died so that they could insult the folks that died? Some kind of logic loop going on here.
Uncle J does the explosive thing, and calls for the Method here.
http://www.blackfive.net/main/2006/11/the_problem_wit.html