We've seen story after story regurgitate the same moral, that being special is always a good thing and, while that is a nice sentiment, there is a side to it that nobody wants to address. When that side of you is prime for ridicule. Being fat, both for the time this episode originally aired and now, has been been one of those for a long time. This is simply a fact of life and victims of bullying will definitely get a sense of self-worth from the more feel-good version of this moral but the truth is, the idea that embracing being overweight, being put on a pedestal because of that, and everyone simply avoiding ridiculing you is the beautiful lie. This episodes gives you the ugly truth without pulling any punches.
What this episode does well is set you up for the beautiful lie but slams you hard with the ugly truth. It does a great job at that. Hank forcing Bobby not to embrace being fat in front of an audience of people despite Bobby really wanting to seems totally immoral at first. You even grow to dislike Hank throughout the episode. At the end, you see just how right Hank was and the episode ends on such a subversive and mean-spirited note that it catches you off-guard and that's what I love about this whole series. It knows how to be satirical without pulling any punches and this episode not only addresses the absurd nature of glorifying overweight people, especially kids, as a symbol of beauty but shows the harsh reality of it. It doesn't endorse making fun of fat people, if anything the fat jokes are left to a minimum. It instead shows that other people will harass others for it because that's just a fact of life that no after school special or heavy-handed "be yourself" message will ever change.
Children don't all develop empathy until their teen years and even then it's minimal, so they tend to be the worst bullies of all. On top of that, kids are definitely not the type of people anyone should be giving such a high and mighty platform to. It not only affects their ego negatively but leaves them even more open to ridicule. At the end of the day, pride about being special in your own way is a good thing, but perhaps some things are best left off a pedestal.
What this episode does well is set you up for the beautiful lie but slams you hard with the ugly truth. It does a great job at that. Hank forcing Bobby not to embrace being fat in front of an audience of people despite Bobby really wanting to seems totally immoral at first. You even grow to dislike Hank throughout the episode. At the end, you see just how right Hank was and the episode ends on such a subversive and mean-spirited note that it catches you off-guard and that's what I love about this whole series. It knows how to be satirical without pulling any punches and this episode not only addresses the absurd nature of glorifying overweight people, especially kids, as a symbol of beauty but shows the harsh reality of it. It doesn't endorse making fun of fat people, if anything the fat jokes are left to a minimum. It instead shows that other people will harass others for it because that's just a fact of life that no after school special or heavy-handed "be yourself" message will ever change.
Children don't all develop empathy until their teen years and even then it's minimal, so they tend to be the worst bullies of all. On top of that, kids are definitely not the type of people anyone should be giving such a high and mighty platform to. It not only affects their ego negatively but leaves them even more open to ridicule. At the end of the day, pride about being special in your own way is a good thing, but perhaps some things are best left off a pedestal.
