Andrew Sullivan reports today in The Sunday Times concerning the row that has erupted in relation to an episode of the cartoon series South Park being “pulled” from a television schedule because it appears to have offended Scientologists.  Now others seem to be jumping on the “cartoons” bandwagon, the willingness to kow-tow to the complainers is unsettling.  There may be solid commercial reasons for this particular example of self censorship, but nevertheless more people with super sensitivities about their beliefs might to be encouraged to chance their arm.  Should this trend continue, a line will have to drawn. 

Mr Sullivan argues,

“…it’s this artful ability to say in cartoon form what you cannot say in any other without a libel writ that makes cartoons irreplaceable…

 

Cartoons and puppetry, as the classic series Spitting Image proved, can convey truths and explore fantasies no other form can.

 

We need those truths and benefit from those fantasies. A free society survives partly because the powerful are mocked, and their pretensions undermined. Religions, which guard their own illusions carefully, are particularly ripe for satire.  And they should be.

 

Whenever one human being is claiming to tell the truth about the meaning of life he is making a very powerful claim — and in a free society he also runs the risk of getting a raspberry. Laughter matters because piety begets power.

 

Orwell once remarked that one reason fascism never took off in Britain was because the sight of a goose-stepping soldier would prompt your average Englishman to giggle. Someone is now silencing the giggles.  And our world is a lot creepier because of it.”

Yes, quite.