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| Home > Reviews > South Park* Conservatives The Revolt Against Liberal Media Bias |
| South Park* Conservatives The Revolt Against Liberal Media Bias | | Date Created: Jun 12, 2005, 12:39 PM |
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*This book has not been prepared, approved, or licensed by any entity that created or produced the cable cartoon program South Park.
South Park Conservatives The Revolt against Liberal Media Bias by Brian C. Anderson is a great concept. The idea according to Brian Anderson who writes for City Journal, is that there is a group of Republicans or conservatives, particularly young ones, who are rebelling against the establishment which is now the liberal establishment. This is epitomized by the subversive, obscene, and crude cartoon show, South Park, and to a lesser extent, The Simpsons.
The concept of "South Park Republicans" is credited to Andrew Sullivan, and there have been several essays on the campus Republicans who, like my son, couldn't be recognized as conservatives but love the cartoon and seem to be breaking out of the Doublespeak of the liberals who dominate our universities and mainstream journalism outlets.
I commented on one such essay and quoted Matt Stone on his attitude toward liberals. There are those who don't think too much of the concept. Jonah Goldberg has this to say:
"I don't know that you can extrapolate from the fact that some Republican kids like South Park that, therefore, there's any such thing as a unifying set of beliefs among them."
Unfortunately, Anderson doesn't develop the concept of South Park convervatives. His book is mostly a history of how the monopoly of liberal mainstream media was broken by talk radio and the internet. There's also extensive documentation of the blogosphere. Anderson's version is a bit less apocalyptic and certainly updated from Hugh Hewitt's, Blog: Understanding the Information Reformation That's Changing Your World.
Anderson's purpose is really:
"... it has become an ugly habit of left-liberal political argument to dismiss conservative ideas as if they don't deserve a hearing, and to redefine mainstream conservative views as extremism and bigotry. A sympathetic old-media regime has allowed liberals to get away with this tendency to argue by invective, rather than to debate ideas seriously, and it has sheltered them from recognizing just how shopworn their ideas have become. The rise of the new Right-friendly media I will analyze in the chapters ahead has made this illiberal, politically correct tendency even more hysterical and strident, since it is forcing liberals to defend their positions, something many have little experience with, resent deeply, and -- often enough -- do poorly. It has also rendered the demagoguery far less effective: The truth can get out.
There's a nice section on anti-liberal PC dogma that can be found in South Park episodes. There is but one chapter on "Campus Conservatives Rising". Interestingly, Anderson seems to have spent a lot of time at Princeton. He quotes several college students. One had this to say about South Park.
"The funniest part is that most liberals watch the show, but are so stupid that they're unaware they're being made fun of."
Anderson has this to say about rebellion:
"Nanny-statism, cries about the economic injustice and 'structural' racism or sexism of American capitalism, anti-globablization protests: It all sounds like BS to many kids today."
"Conservative ideas take on even greater allure to sudents when the authorities say they're verboten. From pervasive campus political correctness -- the unfree speech codes, obligatory diversity-sensitivity seminars, and school-sponsored performances of the Vagina Monologues -- to the professoriate's near-uniform leftism... There's a natural and healthy tendency among students to question the peity of their teachers."
But if you're looking to understand your rebellious young adult on today's campuses and what's going to happen if we hit a 60's type rebellion against authority with the rebels of the 60's now the authority, you won't really find it in this book.
We're moving on to The Future of Music: Mafifesto for the Digital Music Revolution.
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