Censoring the Simpsons

Try to imagine Homer Simpson morphing into a more conscientious, responsible and smarter version of himself as he opens the door to his cubicle in Montgomery Burns’ nuclear power plant. He would always wear protective clothing and handle all the equipment carefully, and of course he would never, ever fall asleep on the job to dream of donuts while accidentally pushing dangerous buttons. And the idea that the series would ever depict radioactive waste being dumped on playgrounds, cooling water being emptied into fishponds or red-hot fuel rods being carelessly tossed out of car windows is absolutely unthinkable.

That would be pedagogically correct, provided we assume young people really have no grasp of irony. But then it would also cease to be so funny. It would, in fact, be so unfunny that America’s most successful cult series would be superfluous. The series, in the final analysis, stands or falls because of its black humor and its merciless political incorrectness.

Too irresponsible and sarcastic

It is exactly this basic principle that Schweizer Fernsehen (SF), the German language branch of the Swiss Television network, completely misses, at least as far as the latest taboo subject of nuclear power goes. Against the backdrop of the Fukushima reactor catastrophe, episodes of the cartoon series dealing with nuclear power are being scrutinized and censored if SF thinks they are too irresponsible and sarcastic on the subject of atomic energy.

On the other hand, the Pro-7 TV network that broadcasts the series in Germany does not intend to censor any of it. Still, there are enough spoilsports here who want exactly that. Concerning the Simpsons series, Communications Sciences Professor Steffen Damm at the Free University of Berlin recently told the German press agency DAPD that “In view of the catastrophe in Japan, if you watch an episode [of the Simpsons] where safety regulations at nuclear facilities are ridiculed, the laugh just sticks in your throat. When push comes to shove and such a worst-case scenario actually materializes, the exaggerations and the calculated breaking of taboos cease to be funny.”

There are plenty of subjects more sensitive than nuclear power

That is exactly the point. The great thing about humor is that it is multi-faceted. Even the macabre can be funny, and quite often it is a fact that the more taboos a joke breaks, the funnier it is. Matt Groening and the show’s other creators grasp that point — and who knows, they may ridicule Swiss Television itself in some upcoming episode. It would not be the first time in the show’s 20-year history that it responded to an attack.

But it is just plain absurd that an American cartoon series would be censored in Europe because of a nuclear reactor catastrophe in Japan. The global comedy police have many other subjects to rile them up. One need only consider all the anti-Semitic, anti-Islamic, anti-Hindu, anti-Buddhist, racist and social-Darwinist jokes that currently poke fun at religious and otherwise untouchable taboos. Surprisingly, and fortunately, nobody has so far mounted an offensive against those.

So far. It is only a matter of time until the guardians of political correctness begin their offensive in this country as well. The next misfortune could help these self-appointed super-moralists in some small way to get fired up about the rest of us alleged sinners.