Talk:The Simpsons

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Presidents

Maybe it should mention the feud with/coverage of George H. W. Bush or other bigwigs, or treatment of politics in general. --Annanoon (talk) 12:06, 14 December 2018 (UTC)

Controversy during debut + Bartmania?

This is a really good article, but I think there should be a section over the controversy surrounding The Simpsons during its debut to the early 90s. Conservatives back then used to criticize the show, and also criticized Bart Simpson as a false role model for children. Also, it'd be interesting if Bartmania was covered too. I'm certain that these probably fit one of the four missions of the wiki.

I'm kinda surprised The Simpsons didn't get an article in the past until now. It's one of the most important sitcoms in America and media in general and it should've gotten one a lot earlier. -𝓪𝓵𝓮𝔁 here! 14:55, 20 December 2018 (UTC)

I remember how controversial the Simpsons were as a kid. I was real little when it came out and I remember the shit storm my church had about it. I even remember the Bush speech where he said we need more "Waltons and less Simpsons" or something boring and old. Funny enough, that speech got me into imitating famous people. A mini-Streisand effect? Anyways, it's funny how mild the Simpsons is (especially an episode like Homer learning a lesson about not objectifying women in the first season) compared to say South Park which really didn't have anywhere near the controversey the Simpsons did on their debut. Wonder if it's the fact that Simpsons and Beavis & Butthead sort of softened the blow for South Park. I agree, a section on the controversy during its debut is worth writing. It was a moral panic back in the early 90's.PeeBay (talk) 12:25, 29 January 2019 (UTC)

Conspiracy Theory

Came across [1] - though the episode is probably based on [2]. Anna Livia (talk) 14:56, 18 August 2023 (UTC)

The Problem With Apu

Uh guys...are you serious about the Apu thing? Here's a rebuttal that has more views than the film's actual trailer. And if that doesn't convince you, here's another rebuttal with more views than the film's actual trailer. And if that doesn't convince you, here's yet another rebuttal with more views than the film's actual trailer. And if THAT doesn't convince you, yet another rebuttal with more views than the actual trailer. On Google Plays, it has a rating of 18%. Just to put that into perspective, Kirk Cameron's "Saving Christmas" has a rating of 29%. The top 20 most helpful reviews on the IMDb all give it one star. If none of this convinces you, there's yet another video where he says at the 0:28 mark that he doesn't give a s**t about Apu. He gets such things wrong as saying that there were no Indian-American entertainers before the Mindy-Aziz era when M. Night Shyamalan's career took off in 1999 with "The Sixth Sense", before the Mindy-Aziz era. He also makes the mistake of saying there were no Indian-American politicians when Dinesh D'Souza's career started in 1987 when Apu was created in 1990. Speaking of D'Souza, on the IMDb, Hari's movie has a rating of 3.9 which is lower than that of "Death Of A Nation" with 4.1. ^{— Unsigned, by: Ericho / talk / contribs}

A) Did you read the RW article? The issue with Apu went well beyond one single documentary. That's why the character is essentially "semi-retired" at the moment.

B) Did you read the RW article? It was pointed out that yes, far from everyone was convinced that Apu was all that problematic (including those outside the "culture wars" who simply are Simpsons fans, and some on the Simpsons writing staff).

C) Comedian Akaash Singh made a career of the controversy, yes. Joe Rogan is one of those people who has (inadvertently or not) figured out that ranting about cancel culture brings in the clicks, so that link doesn't bring much to the argument. (I have not heard whether he has an opinion of "cancel culture" associated with the "right wing", ala the 2023 Bud Light boycott. Would be interesting to find out...)

D) Psy's "Gangam Style" currently has 4.9 billion views on Youtube. By your logic, using views, I guess, comparatively, no one really cares about Rogan or Singh, either.

E) The Simpsons hasn't been any good since Season 10 or so, in my opinion, anyways. BobJohnson (talk) 22:37, 17 December 2023 (UTC)

Okay, but what about the facts that I mentioned? It is a fact that he states in an interview that he doesn't give a s**t about Apu. It is a fact that he was wrong about no Indian-American entertainers existing before 2000 (he doesn't even mention M. Night Shyamalan). It is a fact he was wrong about no Indian-American politicians before 1990 (Dinesh D'Souza). It is also a fact that him labeling Hank Azaria as "white" is misleading as he's Jewish. It is also a fact that Conan O'Brien was a writer for "The Simpsons" and he appears in the opening of the film, yet he never once blames Conan O'Brien for this probably because he's scared to confront him (Hank Azaria did not create "The Simpsons" and it is a fact that Conan is more responsible for Apu's characterization than Hank). It is a fact that there were Indian cartoon characters in American media before 1990. Have you never heard of Mowgli from "The Jungle Book"? That was released in 1967 and he was voiced by a white guy too. These are all solid facts. They are just as much facts as carbon dating showing that the Earth is older than 6,000 years old. Ericho (talk) 00:58, 18 December 2023 (UTC) ^{— Unsigned, by: Ericho / talk / contribs}

On talk pages, please sign your comments using four tildes (~~~~) or by clicking on the sign button: on the toolbar above the edit panel. You can also indent successive talk page comments using one more colon (:) for each line. Thank you. —cosmikdebris ^talk stalk 00:55, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

In the first place, you need sources other than IMDB user reviews and YouTube videos to back up your claims... both are generally speaking very unreliable, and I will say especially for something like this controversy (where the gap between professional critic reviews and "the Internet mob" reviews is quite vast.) "Some people on the Internet are pissed off" is not something you can add to an article, you can say that about anything. The second thing is, does any of these theoretical claimed factual problems matter? The documentary is only a small part of the controversy, which is: some in the Indian community were offended by the Apu caricature. (Some, of course, weren't, and found the whole controversy silly or stupid. "Your mileage may vary".) After some tugs back and forth, the character was semi-retired. Was it the right decision? The debates on the Internet rage on, for those who still care about the Simpsons I suppose.

I could add stuff about the documentary's faults if good sources are found, but a quick glance suggests the documentary was pretty well received by critics; the main criticism I find in professional reviews so far is some puzzlement on the focus on Azaria. On one of your points, the only (partial) quote I found from the documentary so far (from actor and VJ Utkarsh Ambudkar [3], actually) that relates seems to claim that at the time of Apu, "there was no Aziz, no Mindy, no Kal". This doesn't imply that there was *no* Indian actors before the current modern age. But it does imply that there... weren't many. And that's what I've found so far. From my (quick) research, unlike other Asian groups, when The Simpsons premiered in 1989, there really were very few Indian actors in American television, at least in lead roles and not in typecast bits. Kavi Raz actually is notable per the (unsourced, though a Golden Globes page [4] seems to confirm it) Wiki article for being the first Indian to star in a lead cast role in an American prime time series (St. Elsewhere, in this case). This was in 1982, only seven years prior to the Simpsons' premiere. And so far... I've found no other Indian lead cast in the 1990s (though I haven't looked too far). Only in the early 2000s did we see a lot of Indians in lead TV series roles. So I think that's part of the "beef" some people in the community had... your only notable lead Indian on television then was a broad caricature that (per stereotype) owns a convenience store and has a ridiculous faux accent. Some don't mind, sure... Some, however, do, especially I think the younger folks who less grew up on The Simpsons and grew up with the programming of today...

The Simpsons, of course, had a lot of these one-note broad caricatures characters (including one, Comic Book Guy, that kinda was The Simpsons writer response to obnoxious fan armchair quarterbacking :) ). It's part of their thing. I generally don't think broad, crass caricatures of any sort hold up very well in comedy over time, but at least the first decade of The Simpsons had much else going for it, in that it isn't completely cringe (unlike several other 1980s sitcoms are these days) and actually is pretty amusing even today IMHO. BobJohnson (talk) 03:55, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

Okay fine, let's just go by what the critics think and completely ignore what YouTube or the IMDb says. By that definition, does that mean astrology is real? Ericho Oh, and here are some citations. Also, India has a history of blackface in their culture too. (talk) 14:02, 18 December 2023 (UTC)

We don't judge the truth of something by how many YouTube views it gets or the IMDb rating of some film on the subject. That's what the Romans called Argumentum ad populum and is a fallacy. Capricorn One gets 6.8 on IMDb, so does that prove the moon landings were faked? The Dark Knight got 9.0 but Batman isn't real. --Annanoon (talk) 11:23, 19 December 2023 (UTC)