Talking Simpsons - Much Apu About Nothing With Shivam Bhatt
Added 2018-06-20 06:08:27 +0000 UTCWith us this week is Shivam Bhatt of the podcast Commanderin' joins us to talk about this powerfully timely episode of The Simpsons. Shivam talks about his complicated history with the character of Apu and the character's depiction of Indian immigrants. And we dig deep into the immigration debate that this episode brings up, stuff that may as well be ripped out of today's headlines! It'll be a fun/angry episode, so listen to our sentimonies!
Comments
An aspect of this episode's topicalness that stings especially for me is how out-of-nowhere the hard turn towards scapegoating immigrants is. It's given no real explanation, you can extrapolate that maybe they are taking all the welfare or something but this point is never even made, Quimby just says "your taxes are high because of illegal immigrants" and the mob just blindly accepts it, like simply their existence is making the taxes higher somehow. It brings to mind how agonizingly infuriating the current state of the country has regressed, the idiot president can just make some hateful statement and act on it and then we have to waste weeks engaged in debate on issues that should've been left 70 years in the past.
Dylan Martin
2018-06-30 21:49:09 +0000 UTCReally enjoyed the episode. I jumped on the podcast with the "Two Bad Neighbors" episode because of your guest hosts. Thought you guys had a really interesting and nuanced discussion. And you made me rethink the "We're here we're queer we don't want any more bears!" chant. I thought that Homer just came up with the first two parts and added on the last part, but if he ripped it off whole cloth, that adds a whole other dimension to it. I'd also never considered the deliberate choice in using Fat Tony, etc for the fake ID thing. I just figured they made the most sense. Speaking as a man of the Apennine persuasion, I find Italian jokes to be pretty funny, though it does feel a little jarring to hear someone say the various slurs for Italians, hilarious as they may be.
Andrew Crowley
2018-06-27 14:54:34 +0000 UTC
