The censorship drew strong criticism of Comedy Central. Nevertheless, both "200" and "201" were nominated for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program in 2010. Comedy Central modified Parker and Stone's version of the episode, obscuring all images and bleeping all references to Muhammad-to the effect of disruptively obscuring the entire two-minute moral conclusion of the story. Prior to the broadcast of "201", the radical Muslim organization Revolution Muslim posted a warning on their website that Parker and Stone risked being murdered for their depiction of Muhammad. Like "200", it alludes to several past storylines and controversies from previous South Park episodes, especially Comedy Central's refusal to show images of Muhammad on the network following controversies in 20 when cartoons depicting Muhammad ran in European newspapers, resulting in riots and threats.
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The episode was written and directed by series co-creator Trey Parker. In "201", a superhero-like group of religious figures ( The Super Best Friends) team up to save South Park from the celebrities and their monster Mecha-Streisand, while Eric Cartman learns the true identity of his father. The episode continued multiple storylines from the previous episode, " 200", in which a group of angry celebrities demand South Park produce the prophet Muhammad. It originally aired on Comedy Central in the United States on April 21, 2010. " 201" is the sixth episode of the fourteenth season of South Park, and the 201st overall episode of the series. Comedy Central was responsible for censoring the audio, drawing massive criticism from audiences, who felt the network did so in response to Islamic terrorist threats. In the original broadcast and DVD release, the speech is entirely censored with a continuous audio bleep, and Muhammad is replaced by a "CENSORED" bar. No one had to physically attack Comedy Central to make this happen to this day, you can’t stream an authorized version of “201” online.Kyle gives a speech about the effectiveness of threats and violence. But since then there had been protests, violence and threats over the depiction of Muhammad in cartoons in Europe. The show had aired an episode including the prophet in 2001 without incident. In 2010, Comedy Central bleeped a South Park episode, “201,” that included a depiction of Muhammad. But unless all of us reject the kowtowing and the playing-it-safe, it absolutely has worked and will work again. That’s not the inspiring, uplifting thing I want to say right now. (Already, one thriller about North Korea has been cancelled in advance.) It’s all aimed at any media corporation that looks at the headlines of shootings and hacking, thinks of the danger, however remote-not to mention the potential legal liability-and decides, you know what, not worth the trouble.Īnd it works.
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The Sony hack was aimed at anyone considering another movie that might offend radicals. It’s aimed at anyone who reports the next story like this. The slaughter in Paris was aimed at every news organization that now has to decide whether to show the cartoons. Terrorism, by definition, is never just aimed at its direct victims. If speech rights only protected polite comments that everyone could agree with, we wouldn’t need them.Īnd no matter who you are or what you like, these attacks are also attacks on you. But if you care about freedom, you don’t always have the luxury of defending monumental art.