Letter: Concern about ‘South Park’ is misplaced

Published 1:30 am Saturday, August 23, 2025

Editor,

In her Aug. 16 letter, “South Park episode was rude to Trump” Karen Lee says she watched the episode where Trump is in bed with, and is trying to seduce Satan. She found it “rude and uncalled for.”

This is a perfect example of what our constitutional freedoms are all about. Some Americans get to criticize and parody the president; Ms. Lee is free to take offense; and I get to respond to Ms. Lee’s comments.

Obviously, she’s not aware of the long tradition of Americans criticizing our leaders:

From the beginning we had political cartoons depicting George Washington as a wannabe king; John Adams was nicknamed “His Rotundity” because of his figure; and cartoons showed Andrew Jackson as “King Andrew the First” trampling the Constitution with a scepter.

A modern version of this might be Elon Musk posting a meme on ‘X’ showing “His Orange Rotundity, King Donald” tearing up the Constitution with one tiny hand, while he holds the Epstein Files in the other.

If Ms. Lee finds that offensive, can we assume that she also took offense at Trump saying he would lock up Hillary Clinton, or when he threatened to hang General Milley (and be a tyrant for just one day), or when his followers violently assaulted our nation’s capital?

And is Ms. Lee even the least bit offended that “from day one” Trump has been sitting on his tiny hands while Putin illegally murders thousands of innocent people and kidnaps children (at least 16,000 to date)?

If Ms. Lee or others disagree with me, I welcome hearing their opinions. In the words of Donald Trump (Oct. 2024), when Arnold Palmer “took showers with the other pros, they came out of there (and) said, ‘Oh my God, that’s unbelievable.’”

David Freed

Clinton