Randy Marsh, the "Nigger-guy"

I’m not generally a fan of South Park, but I watched the episode where Randy Marsh said “nigger” on Wheel of Fortune and was surprised at how funny and insightful it was.

First, when he was on the show, Randy saw the clue “N_GGERS” with the category “People Who Annoy You” and didn’t even bother to think about the four other vowels that might fit in the space. He didn’t mean to say the word with any malice, but his saying it does indicate that somewhere, deep down, he finds “niggers” to be annoying. I think that South Park’s creators are trying to indicate that many Americans have similar suppressed seeds of racism… or maybe Trey Parker and Matt Stone were just trying to be funny.

But the best part of the show comes halfway into it.

After his blunder, Randy becomes known as the “nigger-guy.” In trying to remove himself from this identity, he founds the Randy Marsh African-American scholarship foundation and presents it in front of an auditorium full of African-American men and women. In his presentation speech, he says:

“You really don’t know how hard it is to be reminded of something lame that happened in your past. I mean I just want to move on from what happened on Wheel of Fortune, you know, and when people call me ‘nigger-guy’, they’re bringing up a painful chapter of my history and all the negativity that went
along with it… you just can’t imagine how that feels.”

They say ignorance is bliss, but in this case, it’s outright comedy. He seems to think that “nigger-guy” is the only word that can remind an individual of a painful past; moreover, he thinks it’s the only word that can belittle someone. Thus, when the tides unexpectedly turn and “nigger-guy” is used in much the same hateful way that “nigger” has been used, Randy desperately seeks a way to distance himself from the term. Instead of giving away the great ending, I’ll propose an alternative one. Maybe Randy should have started using the term in an endearing way, saying things like “how are you doing this morning, nigger-guy?” or “would you like to come play a round of golf with some of my nigger-guys from work?” On second thought, after watching that Japanese short, maybe he shouldn’t.