Pinsky - The gospel according to the Simpsons, bigger and possibly even better! edition with a new afterword exploring South park, Family guy, and other animated TV shows

Testing SimpsonsFile

By Mark I.Pinksky

The Gospel according to TheSimpsons,

Bigger and Possibly EvenBetter! Edition

With a New Afterword Exploring

South Park, Family Guy, and

Other Animated TV Shows

MARK I. PINSKY

2007 Mark I. Pinsky

All rights reserved.

No part of this book maybe reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means,electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or byany information storage or retrieval system, without permission inwriting from the publisher. For information, address WestminsterJohn Knox Press, 100 Witherspoon Street, Louisville, Kentucky40202-1396.

Scripture quotations fromthe Revised Standard Version of the Bible are copyright 1946,1952, 1971, and 1973 by the Division of Christian Education of theNational Council of the Churches of Christ in the U.S.A., and areused by permission.

Scripture quotationsfrom The Holy Bible, New InternationalVersion are copyright 1973, 1978, 1984International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan BiblePublishers.

This ebook is licensed for your personalenjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away toother people. If you would like to share this ebook with anyone,please purchase an additional copy for each person you share itwith. If youre reading this book and did not purchase it, pleasego to Smashwords.com and purchase a copy. Thank you for respectingthe work and intellectual property of the author.

SMASHWORDS EDITION

Print Edition Information:

Book design by Sharon Adams

Second Edition

Published by WestminsterJohn Knox Press, Louisville, Kentucky

07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 151610 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

U.S. Library of CongressCataloging-in-Publication Data

Pinsky, Mark I.

The gospel according to the Simpsons, biggerand possibly even better! edition with a new afterword exploringSouth park, Family guy, and other animated TV shows / Mark I.Pinsky.2nd ed.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references andindex. ISBN 978-0-664-23160-6 (alk. paper)

1. Simpsons (Televisionprogram) 2. Animated television programsUnited States.

3. TelevisionbroadcastingReligious aspects. I. Title. PN1992.77.S58P562007

791.45'72dc222007006909

British Library Cataloguing-in-PublicationData

A catalogue record for this book isavailable from the British Library.

ISBN: 978-0-664-23265-8 (U.K. and Canada)

Praise for the firstedition of The Gospel according to The Simpsons

Thoughtful and genuinelyentertaining.

Publishers Weekly

A seriously funnyexamination of the popular TV show.

Booklist

A straight-faced (yetunavoidably amusing) look at the programs treatment of faith,ethics, and, yes, family values.

Toronto Star

If youbelieve in the power of popular culture to teach Christiantheology, ethics, and values, then Mark Pinskys The Gospel according to The Simpsons needs to be at the top of your readinglist.

Circuit Rider

The Simpsons is one of the mostsubtle pieces of propaganda around in the cause of sense, humility,and virtue. Mark Pinsky manages to decipher the code withoutdeadening the humor, which is quite an achievement.

The Most Reverend RowanWilliams, Archbishop of Canterbury

Ivenever been much of a TV watcher. Its against my religion, as theyused to say. But now Mark Pinskys The Gospel according to The Simpsonshas made me at least a partial convert. I was blind, but now I seethat in The Simpsons anyway, there is goodness galoreintelligence, hilariouswriting, insight, telling social criticism and commentary, andplenty of helpful hints for spiritually challenged people like me.Thanks to Pinsky and The Simpsons my conscience has been caught, my train ofthought has finally left the station, and Ive been thoroughlydelighted without feeling guilty about it. Now when The Simpsons is on, Imin the front row. Ive even learned how to use theremote.

RobertL. Short, author of The GospelAccording to Peanuts

This isa brilliant, witty, readable book, which every Simpsons loverwill want toread, every parent should read, and every Christian needs to readimmediately.

Theodore Baehr, chairman of the Christian Film &Television Commission and publisher of Movieguide

MarkPinksy has written a wonderfully helpful book that everycongregational leader ought to read. At one moment, it containshumorous accounts from TheSimpsons that will lift the readers soulwith mirth. At the next, it provides the aha that comes from aninsightful cultural analysis about the knotty relationship betweenthe American family and popular religion. His book will bring manyrich returns.

Robert Parham, executivedirector, Baptist Center for Ethics

For

Sallie, Liza, andAsher

and

in memory of myparents,

Charlotte and OscarPinsky

George Bush the Elder oncedenounced it; his wife, Barbara, called it dumb. Former EducationSecretary William Bennett questioned its values. So the dilemmaloomed: Should my wife, Sallie, and I allow our young kids towatch The Simpsons ? Many considered the show to be abrasive, abusiveevenabominable. We were concerned, as most parents are, that ourchildren would grow up too quickly because of what they saw on thescreen. When our son Asher (then 11) and our daughter Liza (then 8)took an interest in The Simpsons, I began to watch it with them and was I eversurprised! At first, the popular program featuring a spikey-hairedkid seemed to be the antithesis of LeaveIt to Beaver , a program my brother Pauland I watched with our parents in our suburban home. But the moderncartoon sitcom turned out to be family-friendly and full of faith.Even Barbara Bush and Bill Bennett eventually backpedaled. GeorgeBush pere, whowas able to embrace Saturday NightLive impersonator Dana Carvey, has not yetrecanted his criticism of the series.

How did it happen? Whatmade The Simpsons so popular and its popularity so durable? Would regularviewers be catching some glimpses of faith that the spirituallyfaithful have been trying to communicate for years? What lessonsmight the program have for viewers of varying spiritual, moral,political, and social stripes?

On Sunday nights, whenAmericas best-known dysfunctional family is a fixture in millionsof households, many Christians are in church. At home, the lessdevout were probably tuned to the long-time competition, Touched by an Angel ,which usually won the ratings time period when the two shows wenthead to head. But a lot of people are watching The Simpsons , and have been watchingfaithfully and, yes, religiously for nearly two decades. Simpsons fanstreat Sunday as a day of worship, wrote Jon Horowitz of RutgersUniversity in an unpublished paper. Not early mornings at church;8 P.M. in front of the holiest of holies, the TV tuned into the FOXnetwork.

In addition to themillions who watch the series each week, millions more tune in eachweek to watch reruns of the show in syndication (it was still ratedfirst among all rerun shows in the 19941995 season). More than 180Fox affiliates carry the new episodes on Sunday nights. Over 250stations in the U.S. and Canada air the highly rated reruns, sometwice a day or more. Around the world, it is more popularthan Baywatch ,reaching sixty million people a week in more than seventy countries(though not in Costa Rica or the Dominican Republic, where it isbanned as an affront to family values, or in prime time in China,to avoid competing against local programs), dubbed in dozens oflanguages. A syndicated Sunday comic strip in 250 newspapersreaches an audience of fourteen million, and hundreds of thousandsof copies of more than two dozen authorized books about the showhave been soldpart of a billion-dollar Simpsons merchandise industry. Bythe 1990s there were more than a thousand Simpsons Web sites incyberspace.