The recent episode of "South Park" Season 19 called "Safe Space" trended last Monday night with the hashtag #ShamelessAmerica as the episode tackled on bullying. The creators tackled the issue in a way that the humor was still there and it included parodies of Vin Diesel, Demi Lovato and Steven Seagal, who was particularly body-shamed for their heavy physique in real life.
The scene with Randy Marsh insulted by the cashier at Whole Foods Market illustrated a kind of emotional shaming on the part of Randy. In this scene, the cashier asked Randy to donate one dollar to help the starving children. Randy declined reluctantly. The cashier did not like his answer, however, as he continued to insult Randy, in a loud voice for all to hear, for not giving a dollar.
On the other hand, Eric Cartman posted a shirtless picture of himself on Twitter and the post quickly garnered lots of negative insults. PC Principal was quick to think of a solution to Eric's dilemma and assigned Butters to filter Eric's Twitter feeds. Butters made quite an excellent job that PC Principal offered the services to plus size models.
According to IGN, Randy's experience was "not only relatable but it also touched on some of the same points Cartman's storyline addressed, but in a finer, more innovative way."
One of the top scenes in the episode, according to Design & Trend, was about Reality, his goal of destroying "those who would ignore his existence", in particular Eric and Randy, and ultimately Reality's public death.
Going back to Randy, he eventually gave $1 dollar to the hungry kids, but it was not nearly good enough for the Whole Foods cashier, according to 411 Mania.
"South Park" managed to include these kinds of socio-political issues in their episodes to which the audience can relate to. The episode definitely provided a different point of view when it comes to shaming and bullying, even with the humor that came with it.
"South Park" airs every Wednesday night at 10 on Comedy Central.
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