See, Marge, strangling the boy has paid off," Homer quipped to his wife. “Just kidding. I don’t do that anymore.”
Homer then added with a smile, “Times have changed!”
I think it’s a joke about liberal virtue signaling. He doesn’t understand why times have changed nor does he tackle morality in his reasoning, he’s just an idiot. But times have changed, so he’s less abhorrent now.
Simpsons really did challenge culture and now it’s become culture.
That being said it was edgy for the reasons not because of a white man voicing Apu or Homer strangling Bart. The edginess were its ideas and satirical humour compared to anything else on TV at the time. I’m in favour of Homer not strangling Bart and retiring Apu. Keeping these things wouldn’t help anyone, or suddenly make the show great again.
wait their response to people criticizing Apu being voiced by a white guy was to stop using the character? surely they could have just hired an Indian voice actor.
I don’t think Homer strangling Bart is the same as the Apu thing.
The strangling was never depicted as acceptable behaviour. It was a cartoonish form of corporal punishment, and served to make Homer look bad tempered and not a great father. I don’t think anyone, in the 90s or now, is taking parenting tips from Homer Simpson.
Its just another classic gag gone from a show that’s a shell of its former self. I agree with what you said about it becoming the culture though, they really should’ve cancelled it 20 years ago.
Apparently it’s still widely popular for a new generation. I haven’t watched in years but used to watch every week and usually nightly reruns, as a kid.
Who cares if it’s different now? People are still watching and laughing at the jokes.
Trying to be a good father is one of homers driving moral compasses. Often he does things to his kids that are bad and stupid but those are then the main story of the episode and he does his best to fix the wrongs he did, often by being genuinely empathic and understanding to his kids. The strangling is just abusive and there is never a consequence or resolution to it. That is a clear signal from the show that they think it’s an ok “character flaw” to have.
I wrote about this exactly thing in college philosophy coursework 20 years ago.
I concluded that homer had an abuser mentality, that he would have understood his abuse “as tough love.” There’s an episode where he strangles Bart and gets all sad about “why do you make me strangle you?” or something to that effect. And another where he starts strangling Bart but then realizes Bart actually did the right thing, and he stops strangling him and they have a nice father son moment.
My takeaway is that Homer is a complicated guy. He’s both good and bad, as I suspect are we all. Also hurt people, hurt people.
In defence of the strangling, I assumed it was a 3 stooges inspired slapstick humour that didn’t have any malice intentions when writing. Def a good call to just end it
Well, I see you’re a fan of the classics! Horsin’ Around certainly had its charm, but let’s not forget about the underappreciated gem, Ethan Around. Sure, it was cancelled after a horse-related hiccup (quite literally), but it had potential to be more than just a one-trick pony.
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