Sample television paper

J.S.

A great man (well, me actually) once said that every great question of humanity has been answered at one time or another by the Simpsons. Obviously that was said in jest, but there does seem to be a certain air of, "Oh yeah, that's exactly how it is" when one is watching the show. Certainly the show offers no concrete solution about how to end world hunger, but the whole appeal of the show seems to come from the blatant truth that the show gives us. Every thing that we see on The Simpsons can be viewed as a representation, or stereotype depending on your politics, of some aspect of American culture. It's like America Concentrate. You take all of the different groups and subcultures in the country, give them one or two representatives, and crams them all together in one small town and you have Simpsons . That is the staying power of the show; almost everyone can identify with some aspect of it. For the working father you have Homer, for the housewife you have Marge, for the capitalist bastards you have Montgomery Burns, and for the honest small businessmen you have Ahpoo . And none of these characters are black and white. Even the vilest of villains, Montgomery Burns, has a soft spot in his heart for his beloved teddy bear. There are always those who just don't appreciate the joke, but they are few and far between. Over and over again The Simpsons has demonstrated near universal appeal and the ability to tell every side of the story.

Let 's start with the obvious, Homer. Homer is the essence of the American working father; big, dumb, easily angered, and all around lovable. He can ' t figure out how to use a touch tone phone, he plans to become rich by selling sugar that he found on a highway door to door, and when faced with the choice between attempting laundry and wearing Marge 's wedding gown he opts for the wedding gown. It ' s exaggerated of course, but how many fathers out there have trouble programming the VCR or go to ridiculous lengths to avoid doing the laundry? Homer is tragically unaware of the events that transpire around him, so much that he is willing to trade his dental insurance for a keg of beer. The average working class man is pro-America and anti-tax, though realistically higher taxes would be in their interest and America is not really on their side. But deep down Homer is a loving and supportive human being. When things are at their worst, Homer is at his best. He pays no attention to his son, Bart, until a crisis arises and Bart intends to jump Springfield Gorge. When it is obvious that Bart will never listen to Homer about the danger that his stunt involves, Homer comes to the conclusion that his son will only see how dangerous it is if he attempts the jump himself and gets terribly hurt in the process. Not the most logical decision in the world, but one made out of pure love. Many men aren ' t particularly good at being fathers, but they almost always want what is best for their children. Even Homer ' s physical appearance is symbolic. He is overweight, as most men seem to be after their teens. He is balding, and terribly self-conscious about it, as many men are. He is physically unfit and brimming with inad e q u acy. He is in short what every man hopes he isn 't but fears he is.

Marge, conversely, is a pro at mothering and problem solving. She cooks, cleans, bandages, and takes all around care of the entire Simpson family. She is the super-mom that every American mother is supposed to be to counteract the not-so-super-dad that the Homers of America are. But she, like all human beings, is not perfect. For all her motherly support and wisdom she has many human flaws. She is a gambling addict, she has a deep rooted fear of flying, and she is a compulsive cleaner. Plus at one point the stress becomes too much for her and she has a nervous breakdown. Her figure remains slim in contrast to Homer's bulge, though she is dutifully concerned about her weight. When Marge is exasperated at Homer's antics, every viewing wife/mother is frustrated with her and for her, because in a less pronounced way they are all married to a Homer. She gets no support, no thanks, and no daily appreciation. But she does everything for her family day in and day out because deep down she knows that her family loves her more than any other thing in the entire world.

Probably the best thing about the Simpsons is its uncanny ability to avoid preaching. Nobody wants to be told what to think, but most of us could use a reminder about some of the things that are happening around us. If the show can gently remind the average working class family member that important things are happening all around them, then it is truly doing us a service. But through all of the issues it touches on, it rarely has a direct moral and always asks more questions than it answers. It is obvious that the writers are concerned with forcing people to look at the world around them rather than just spoon feeding them more opinions. And because it avoids preaching it doesn't specifically alienate or reject any given group or subculture. Rather they tell every group's story in an equally humorous and exaggerated manner. Italians can laugh at the Mafia stereotype as much as principals can laugh "at their stereotype, Seymour Skinner. Ahpoo, the Indian, is portrayed as one of the most intelligent and humane characters on the show while it playfully pokes fun at his Quickee Mart at the same time. The Simpsons does an excellent job of reminding us that none of us is perfect, and by doing so in a humorous way it makes it easier to accept. In fact, the only people that actively dislike the show seem to be those individuals (George Bush for example) whose livelihood depends on their conservative, ideological ethos. George Bush hated the show so much because his much of his validity was based on his idea that America would be in better condition if the American family would act the way it was supposed to. Or in other words the way it used to. The Simpsons challenged that and undermined his point. Most of the shows opponents are individuals who have a great deal of stock in the Ghost of the America Past. The fact that these types of people are angered by the show is probably a positive thing to most of us. In short, I think the staying power of the show is simply that we enjoy it because we need it.

Then we have the character that is the complete moral opposite of Marge, Montgomery Burns. Twisted and cunning, Mr. Burns is interested in only one thing: money. He is the embodiment of Big Business. He has enough money to buy his way out of any situation, and consequently has never felt the need to develop any sort of conscience. Dumping toxic waste in the children's playground is the obvious course of action since it saves him money. In the rare event that he gets caught engaging in an illegal activity he can always write a check for the fifteen million dollars in fines. Americans from low and middle income families love to hate him like no villain since J.R. Ewing (who shot Burns, who shot JR : coincidence? ) . They cringe when they see how the system works for him and that others are more or less at his mercy, they rejoice when he is defeated by a Homer-led union, and they applaud when he is shot in the act of taking candy from a baby. Yet even this villain of villains has a softness for his teddy bear, giving him some minimal degree of humanity for the audience to sympathize with.

And speaking of cartoons, no look at the Simpsons would be complete without considering the cartoon within the cartoon: Itchy and Scratchy. Every episode is pretty much the same; Itchy the mouse finds extremely gory and sadistic ways to kill Scratchy the Cat. The cartoon ends with the message, The preceding program contained scenes of violent nature which may have been inappropriate for young children. Unsupervised children should not have watched. The only person ever to question the acceptability of the show, Marge Simpson, is immediately shot down by those who jump on the banner of free speech, which raises the question of morals vs free speech . The Simpson children invariably laugh hysterically at the violence and rejoice in Scratchy's pain, pointing to the increasing indifference toward violence in pop-culture. Added to the show is the comical irony that Itchy should be the underdog in a normal cat-mouse relationship but the underdog wins in this case. this paper was stolen off web: http://people.ucsc.edu/~pmmckerc/tveg.html

The youth is embodied in Bart and Lisa, the Simpson children. Each of them represents a different piece of the youth culture. Bart is the rebel without a cause. He does exactly what he is told not to do in part because it's fun, but mostly just because he wants attention. Lisa in contrast is the activist with a cause . She does what she believes to be morally right, but the attention she gets for being so smart is not unwelcome. The bottom line is that they both basically just want to be recognized for something, as all young people do. A n interesting note is how the characteristics of the youth got divided up between the two. Bart, the boy, is selfish, rude, narrow minded, and untrustworthy. He has no significant plans for his adult life and he seems to be utterly oblivious to the things around him that don ' t literall y hit him in the face. These are the things that adults say about the youth when they are displeased with us for some reason or another, and Bart is constantly displeasing authority figures. Lisa, the girl, is giving A , polite, open minded, and she always keeps her word. She is going places in life and she knows what is happening in the world around her. These are things adults talk about when they are pleased with the youth, and Lisa often pleases the authority figures around her. It seems to send the age old message that little boys are made of snips and snails and puppy-dogs' tails, while girls are made of sugar and spice and everything nice. But like everything about this show, that too is not absolute. At one point we find Bart on the side of law and order as he becomes a Hall Monitor and Lisa on the side of blatant rebellion. The show thoughtfully reminds us that nothing is hard and fast, and there are two sides to every coin. Bart and Lisa, like the youth of America, are so different on the surface but share some very basic and important characteristics on the inside. On the rare occasions when they work together they are a very effective team capable of almost anything they set their minds to. But the odds of getting them to stop the petty arguing are slim. Audiences from elementary school to college all feel a connection with Bart 's rebellion and Lisa 's vision, an obvious sign that they represent more than the second and fourth graders that they are in the cartoon. plagiarized

At times the show seems to come dangerously close to validating Burns' behavior or making him too human too effectively represent his threat. Because we all know that Burns is a frail old man (to be pitied in many ways) and that deep down he is as human as the rest of us, we can almost forgive the despicable acts he commits. When Burns is caught dumping toxic waste in the children's' playground, he writes a check for fifteen million dollars and that is the end of the issue. Not only is that money used in a manner that pleases most of the town, but there are no lasting consequences to the actual dumping. Nowhere do we see that children are getting radiation sickness nor do we have any guarantees that he hasn't simply relocated his dumping to the old folks home. In real life, however, that kind of act would be considered the epitome of all evil. Is The Simpsons unwittingly softening our reactions to the real life Burns? Creator Matt Groening feels that he is providing a service to people who would go mad without a release for all of their tensions. Others might argue that they might do something about the actual problems they face if they didn't have a release for their tensions. Unfortunately, at times The Simpsons does fall into the trap of over humanizing the bad guy and thus justifying his actions. But for the most part the message seems to be that only by standing up to the bad guy (Burns) can you stop him. When Burns attempts to cancel the company dental plan, Homer goes leads the plant in a strike and the dental plan is saved. When Burns was manufacturing biological weapons in the sixties, Homer's mother joins the Hippie Movement and together they sabotage the evil operation. By uniting on the side of good, evil can be stopped. It is only when Burns doesn't meet resistance, as in the toxic waste, that he gets away with his evil deeds.

One of the long time haunting questions about The Simpsons has to do with the relationship between Lisa and Itchy and Scratchy. Why does Lisa, the humane liberal , laugh at this sick and violent cartoon? The creators are trying very hard to reinforce the fact that The Simpsons is just a cartoon. It should under no circumstances be taken overly seriously. By having Lisa laugh at something on TV that she would frown upon in reality, they send the message that cartoons are not to be held responsible for peoples actions. First and foremost, the purpose of the show is to make people laugh. All that means is that we have to take a little responsibility for ourselves and decide the difference between a valid message and some throw away comedy. There are certainly a few individuals out there that won't understand that, but for the most part we can all take that hint.