1001 Animations: Osama Bin Laden has Farty Pants

Show: South Park
Episode: S5 E9
Year: 2001

Writer(s): Trey Parker

September 11, 2001, or simply 9/11, was one of the greatest tragedies to ever hit America since the Pearl Harbor bombing in 1941. Nearly 3000 people lost their lives in the ensuing bombings, and it changed the world forever by showing how unprepared the USA was for such an event. This brought about a wave of paranoia and mass fear to the United States at large, with many worrying about if or when another attack would occur, and as a result, it made us wonder how television shows would look after such a horrific event.

 

This is the episode that solidified South Park as the go-to adult cartoon for social commentary and political satire the world over! I'm not saying it's the funniest episode of the show, I'm not saying it's my favorite episode either; heck, it's not even the most entertaining! But this is easily the most important episode of the entire show, and I can see why the Nostalgia Critic put it at #1 of his "Top 11 South Park Episodes" list. This episode not only taught us to laugh in the face of those that sought to bring America to its knees, but also showed us how this terrorist attack affected those actually living in the Middle East. As shocking as it is to hear, not every Muslim, Afghan or Arab is a terrorist. Many of them that were affected by our attack against Afghanistan were left homeless and on the throes of death, having never even been involved with Osama Bin Laden or Al Qaeda in the first place.

 

To be able to see both sides of this world-changing conflict is something almost rarely done with shows that dealt with 9/11 and its aftermath: most just want to make the US the victims and purely in the right for our retaliation, but no, in the eyes of the Afghan people, WE were the terrorists! And even in the names of Allah and shit like that many of them never supported Bin Laden and his "freedom fighting" cause. This episode is to 9/11 what the Looney Tunes short Daffy – The Commando was to World War II, a way for the United States to show our foreign enemies we were NOT going to sit idly by and let them do whatever they wanted! THAT WE ARE NOT GOING TO GIVE INTO FEAR! Because that in and of itself is the primary goal of terrorism at its core: forcing others to give into fear and make them lose hope.

 

And even though this episode goes pretty deep into the Middle Eastern conflict and how paranoid the world became in 9/11's wake, it's still pretty damn funny, as is on-par for South Park. How many times are you going to see homage to Bug Bunny starring Eric Cartman and the titular terrorist? South Park showed the world at large we weren't going to take shit from Al Qaeda! Not only did it reignite hope for our nation, but it also taught us to laugh in the face of uncertainty and fear, and for this I say: thank you, Trey Parker and Matt Stone; simply, thank you!

South Park is owned by Comedy Central and Viacom.

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