(no subject)

[lollardfish]

Can anyone more knowledgeable than I point out any examples of the Vilification Tennis show doing productive social satire - that is, making fun of something in order to demonstrate its impropriety or nonsensical nature?

I'm seeing excuses that I shouldn't be offended at their upcoming show because it's productive social satire.

I think it's just an excuse and the show isn't about satire, it's about getting laughs by being as mean as possible. They are really good at it. They get a lot of laughs. I think they're kidding themselves about the satire, but I'm not that familiar with their shows.

Comments

[jmanna.livejournal.com]

Okay, just trying to clarify, it seems there's a lot of responsibility = malicious intent in the comments, not perhaps attributed by you but there it is. But my question is more along the lines of Why is vilification instantly hurtful where South Park requires contemplation? Is it just the use of that single word? Not arguing, just trying to clarify your position. Signal to noise and all.

[lollardfish.livejournal.com]

Hey, I deleted the comment above because I said vast majority when I wanted to say minority, and didn't want to convey a false impression.

I'm not sure it's necessary to re-hash why the VT show title was offensive. I think Tim's discussion with me down below this thread somewhere covers that ground pretty well.

I'm trying to work with something that I find slippery. If this week the SP people do a show taunting fat people for being fat, propagating the idea that the fat should be mocked and marginalized, I think that's pretty clearly wrong. You may not. If next week they do a show demonstrating hypocrisy in the Catholic Church as regards pedophile priests, I think that's much more defensible. So the moral question at hand is that if I am offended by this week's show, is it morally inconsistent to watch next week's show, although not offensive to me. I'm leaning towards the answer yes, in order to be morally consistent, I need to stop watching the show altogether, regardless of subject matter. I am having trouble articulating why, though.