In the wake of Charlie Kirk’s assassination, some conservatives are pointing fingers at South Park for mocking the conservative thought leader in a recent episode, while Comedy Central pulled the episode from a scheduled repeat Wednesday night.
The second episode of the current season of Comedy Central’s satirical hit — titled “Got a Nut” — had Eric Cartman becoming a right-wing podcaster and spouting tropes used by Kirk, who tours college campuses debating progressive students. “Who wants to debate the master debater?” demanded Cartman, who also took on Kirk’s hairstyle and later attended a ceremony giving out “The Charlie Kirk Award for Young Masterdebaters.”
The mockery was pretty tame by South Park standards (certainly kinder than its treatment of Homeland Secretary Kristi Noem in the same episode). After the episode aired, Kirk seemed thrilled by satire and posted a TikTok (below) reacting to the mockery by calling the episode “hilarious” and noted “South Park gets this right.” The Turning Point USA founder added, “We have a good spirit about being made fun of. This is all a win. We as conservatives have thick skin, not thin skin, and you can make fun of us and it doesn’t matter.”
But after Kirk’s tragic murder at Utah Valley University while engaged in the same sort of college campus debate the episode poked fun of, some MAGA conservatives are blasting the show.
According to the New York Post, one Turning Point USA staffer posted on Telegram, “Comedy has consequences. Charlie was targeted in the culture before he was targeted in real life” and right-wing radio host Jesse Kelly told his listeners: “South Park thought it was funny to turn Charlie into a cartoon joke. Now his wife is planning a funeral.”
The Daily Beast spotted some other comments boiling on social media: “Let’s blame South Park. Blame the media. Blame leftist rhetoric. These people hate you and want to see you dead.” And: “South Park certainly fomented the hatred necessary to get Kirk assassinated.” And: “[South Park creators] Trey Parker and Matt Stone are responsible for this.” While a popular account called Johnny MAGA dubbed South Park “monsters” for the episode.
That said, many others on the right were quick to note they don’t blame the series. One “MAGA” labeled X account wrote, “I don’t blame South Park. They aren’t our leaders, representatives, mentors, pastors, example setters or societal caretakers. They are satire!”
Comedy Central had no immediate comment on yesterday’s scrapped repeat, and the episode was still available on Paramount+ as of Thursday morning. Pulling episodes that unintentionally intersect with a violent real-life tragedy is a common practice, as a respectful effort to not to inflame a situation.
Given South Park has been on a tear going after President Trump and MAGA this season, and frequently pivots at the last minute to tackle current events in their episodes, it will be interesting to see what creators Parker and Stone focus on when the show returns next week amid its new biweekly roll-out schedule this season.
On a Reddit thread about the episode being pulled, fans agreed it was “the polite thing to do” while also agreeing South Park doesn’t deserve blame for what happened. “Probably a smart decision, no matter your feeling on him; don’t give either side reason to exploit this,” wrote one. While another opined, “You really can’t fault them for not predicting this; I don’t think anyone could have predicted this series of events with him literally talking about gun violence as he was being shot.”
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