Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

twitter.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

91–100 of 248 posts

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#91

Post by hackermang »

viscanti wrote: post #25
Waterluvian wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not saying they don't have a political leaning, but they often focus their energy and 22 minutes on showing just how wildly absurd a situation is. For me, that's a big ingredient in why they've stayed so entertaining.

They're also a big proponent of bothsideism. For some topics that makes sense (because there are two legitimate or legitimately absurd sides). For other topics it just pollutes discourse by elevating an illegitimate side.

Could you provide us a list of all legitimate sides?

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#92

Post by MagnumPIG »

mrep wrote: post #84
i_am_nomad wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the name of all that is holy, why would anyone rip off that show? It is literally the worst thing I have ever seen on television, excluding reality TV. And I say that as someone who grew up during TV’s dismal 1980s.

> In the name of all that is holy, why would anyone rip off that show? It is literally the worst thing I have ever seen on television While I have never seen the show, 10-20 million people apparently watch it [0] so apparently a lot of people do like it and your tone comes off as condescending. [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Big_Bang_Theory#U.S._stand...

Furthermore, apart from the fact that geek culture has always had a hate-on for TBBT, we don't import/export TV show concepts because they are perceived as good, but rather because they are seen as profitable. Good is subjective, money is its own metric.

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#93

Post by turk73 »

toomanyrichies wrote: post #81

Comedy Central is owned by Viacom, which also owns Paramount Pictures. China is a huge market for Paramount's films. Paramount has previously explored a 49% sale to China's Wanda Group, and they currently have extensive financial backing from the Shanghai Film Group Corp.[2] If they wanted to, it's well within the purview of the CCP to apply pressure to Paramount's ability to finance its films or distribute those fil…

Self-censorship is still censorship. If these companies crater to the least common denominator, then free speech in the West is also doomed. We can't allow that to happen. Putting profits ahead of everything else is a sure way to go broke because it sacrifices quality and every other good for the sake of short-term profit. We saw Disney do this with Star Wars, trying to pander to Asian audiences and failing miserably. Now Disney has alienated their original fan base. Soon, nobody is going to care about anything Star Wars. Disney needs to smarten up.

Every company that thinks they can do business with communists needs to smarten up. Realize that you compromise your ethics completely and whatever short term gains you think you are making are eventually eaten away by the sheer clown world lunacy that is communism. Places like China can never right themselves simply because basic truths are banned from being discussed. How do they then move forward as a society? They don't, they can only move backwards.

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#94

Post by okcando »

bfm1982 wrote: post #28
viscanti wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're also a big proponent of bothsideism. For some topics that makes sense (because there are two legitimate or legitimately absurd sides). For other topics it just pollutes discourse by elevating an illegitimate side.

"I like the style when it fits my beliefs, but this comedy show is polluting discourse when I disagree with it"

Yours is a good example, if a bit meta, of one side arguing in bad faith and being less legitimate than the other. Arguably so is this one.

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#95

Post by fooker »

viscanti wrote: post #25
Waterluvian wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not saying they don't have a political leaning, but they often focus their energy and 22 minutes on showing just how wildly absurd a situation is. For me, that's a big ingredient in why they've stayed so entertaining.

They're also a big proponent of bothsideism. For some topics that makes sense (because there are two legitimate or legitimately absurd sides). For other topics it just pollutes discourse by elevating an illegitimate side.

An illegitimate side according you, might not be illegitimate in general.

I'm not saying there are no universally illegitimate sides, but even those have their supporters and some reasonable arguments. The focus should be on deconstructing these arguments instead of marking the side as illegitimate.

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#96

Post by derrikcurran »

rqs wrote: post #22

I'm not a South Park fan, but that ban got my interested so I watched the episode (Yeah, that episode is banned in China and few "reposter"s has been warned for posting South Park related contents). Few days ago, a guy been sent to jail for 7 days because he was complaining the National Day military parade, saying something like "A civilized nation turn machine into soldier; a rouge nation turn soldier into machine".…

I understand what you're saying. Some of the other commenters are being inconsiderate. It's dangerous when a nation loses the ability to criticize its government.

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#99

Post by okcando »

fooker wrote: post #95
viscanti wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They're also a big proponent of bothsideism. For some topics that makes sense (because there are two legitimate or legitimately absurd sides). For other topics it just pollutes discourse by elevating an illegitimate side.

An illegitimate side according you, might not be illegitimate in general. I'm not saying there are no universally illegitimate sides, but even those have their supporters and some reasonable arguments. The focus should be on deconstructing these arguments instead of marking the side as illegitimate.

The way I see it, we're drawing from a pool where most ideas are bad. Most problems (or, more broadly, "systems") have unsettlingly narrow parameters under which we can secure a beneficial outcome. Like the human body: a very narrow happy path flanked on both sides by a boundless abyss of deranged and dysfunctional pathologies limited only by your imagination.

I don't have an answer for how to identify good ideas that's convincing to everyone, especially in the flimsy-whimsy domain of politics, but I believe there are always more than two sides even if it's presented that way. There are uncountable many "sides" and most of them are bad, wrong, and insane. And to entertain all of them in earnest under the pretenses that we're being fair is a paralyzing waste of time.

Even for a comedy show. It's not really about the show anyway but the bigger picture of politics that it fits into.

Re: South Park Responds to Being Banned in China for “Band in China”

#100

Post by jaimex2 »

anm89 wrote: post #49

Is it fair to assume that this is all of comedy Central giving China the finger as well as just the south park team? I would imagine China would take this up to the producers? And I imagine Comedy Central is directly involved in the production/funding? If so that's a pretty awesome and hold move on their part. I could see this leading to other shows feeling compelled to choose a side as well. I hope it does.

My understanding is South Park create the episode on the fly and deliver it to Comedy Central hours before airing it. They don't get any time to review it.
Post reply on HN