https://youtu.be/RE8cI431eBQ
While we’re pissing people off, enjoy this gruesomely funny Family Guy track: “The AIDS Song.”
Happy Friday!
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Jeremy
You’re pretty disgusting. I’m no longer a fan.
thatguyfromboston
Andrew, I’m a huge fan! and not just positive, but hiv positive….(see South Park).
And I loved the Matzo post too.
Jeremy
Sadly, it seems that Andrew Belonsky, like most bloggers, is a huge narcissist blowhard who can’t accept criticism of his “work.” So, like the immature little baby that he is, he posts this video…obnoxious not because it’s “offensive”, but because it illustrates how petulant the blogger who posted it really is.
CitizenGeek
Yeah, I don’t see what the purpose of -actively trying- to insult people is. Sure, I like Family Guy and that song is kind of funny; but you know it’s offensive, so why post it? :s
me
I’d say only to embed the owner’s version, not a copy.
http://www.hulu.com/watch/5547/family-guy-you-have-aids
Rod
PLEEEASE “Jeremy”, take a valium. It’s Friday! Thank god Andrew isn’t afraid to cross the line a little bit and post funny, interesting albeit offensive things once in a while. Obviously he’s doing something right or you wouldn’t be clicking and posting like you do.
Maverick69
I guess as a Puerto Rican Gay New Yorker who is +
I would find if refreshing to have a barbershop quartet sing me the bad news, Shit you’re near the end.
I get you Andrew, I’m a Jew by heart living in this city nearly 40 years.
It still leaves the WOW factor though.
GodricGryffindork
hey everyone instead of bitching at Andrew for posting this if your offended maybe bitch to the people who put it on TV in the first place. Its not like he wrote it and performed it, plus he clearly stated that it was offensive.
you people make no sense to me
go on Andrew, push the envelope even more!
Jono
black humor
in literature, drama, and film, grotesque or morbid humor used to express the absurdity, insensitivity, paradox, and cruelty of the modern world. Ordinary characters or situations are usually exaggerated far beyond the limits of normal satire or irony. Black humor uses devices often associated with tragedy and is sometimes equated with tragic farce. For example, Stanley Kubrick’s film Dr. Strangelove; or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1963) is a terrifying comic treatment of the circumstances surrounding the dropping of an atom bomb, while Jules Feiffer’s comedy Little Murders (1965) is a delineation of the horrors of modern urban life, focusing particularly on random assassinations. The novels of such writers as Kurt Vonnegut, Thomas Pynchon, John Barth, Joseph Heller, and Philip Roth contain elements of black humor.
anyone? anyone?
dellisonly
Every person who posted a response needs to lighten up including myself. We work ourselves up into a frenzy over idiotic crap that in the long run will be irrelevant. Take your medication. Breathe. Then move on with your day.
Jeremy
yeah…I’m sorry Andrew. I was a bit harsh.
ggreen
How many people living with AIDS think that’s funny? Let hear them sing a song titled “Let’s Cut Your Tits Off†about brest cancer. Ha Ha cant stop laughing!!!
chris
that wasnt very nice.
mashed potatoes!
Dawster
actually, there is at least ONE person with AIDS that finds it funny….
he’s a friend of mine and he was living with me for a while… we saw this at the same time and both of us laughed out loud when we saw this episode.
so as far as i’m concerned, anyone who doesn’t find this funny can go fuck themselves.
Snoodle
*Winces* I can usually find humour in things but this I just never could 🙁
ggreen
Dawster:
So glad that God called you with the bill-of-fare for what’s funny and what’s offensive. Maybe you should ask your “friend†again when he vomits for 4 or 5 days in a row from one of the many unpleasant treatments for this funny disease. Or after he loses the use of his feet due to neuropathy. HA HA AIDS is SOOOO funny.
Dawster
Green:
actually he is all morphine’d up at the moment. but back when this aired, he said “damn, that’s much cooler than the way the doctor told me…”
and yes… he does throw up every third time he eats, he’s on Hospic care, and he is taking more medication than i could possibly list (including one for his legs).
i would thank you for not being so disrespectful towards one of the best DJ’s i’ve ever had the privilege of knowing.
last week he bought a shirt with the logo “when i die i’m going to haunt all of you”.
humor is all we have. take it or leave it, but don’t degrade those that use it when they need it.
Dido 2 Belinda
When I am laid in earth
Let my wrongs create
No trouble in thy breast
Remember me, but oh! forget my fate.
Afroguapo
I’ve never understood this over the top irreverent Sarah Silverman type of humor (e.g., when she pretended she had AIDS and became a spokesperson). That being said, Family Guy does push the envelope on many facets of life. They once did an episode where the Griffin family went back in time as slaves and Lois was the lady of the plantation who ran off with Peter, one of the field slaves. It was funny because it was so silly preposterous. However, there’s something about this that seems to make it go beyond the pale. Perhaps because we have seen friends or family die of the disease or even glimpsed it on some documentary, it’s too familiar/personal. It reminds me of some cartoon I saw (maybe South Park) where they had an African child suffering from famine/starvation with flies swarming around him, and I found it repellent because such children actually do exist in this manner so it’s not like a Mel Brooks joke making fun of something in the past (we’ve all seen the Sally Struthers programs) and it’s warping the minds of kids/teens who have an increasingly distorted view of what constitutes humor. Dawster, realize your friend is positive but is it possible he had dementia when he was laughing about this? Personally, I’d want to know if those with HIV/or AIDS found this funny rather than a bunch of negative guys weighing in and making that determination.
REBELComx
Personlly I thought this was one of the funniest musical moments of the show. I don’t see why it’s so offensive. They aren’t making fun of the disease OR the guy who has it. It’s extremism – Tell someone horrible news but in a REALLY good way, and maybe it won’t sound so bad. At no point did they sing about what to do now (a la the above “cut your tits off” comment – really overreacting). They weren’t making a judgement. They were just breaking the news to the poor guy in a manner that my lower the shock of the news itself.
People need to lighten the fuck up.
GodricGryffindork
Afroguapo, I honestly am most offended by your comment because I feel that something that you said is extremely ignorant, more than anything that I have seen on this website, maybe I am biased because of my age, but when you say it is warping the minds of kids and teens, I think that you should think about what you say again.
I am 17 years old and I personaly find this clip quite funny, however it has nothing to do with the fact that it is Family Guy or whatever, seeing as though I have never watched an episode in my life, I don’t find the stupid humor of shows like that and The Simpsons and South Park funny at all. This clip is funny simply for the fact that it brings humor into a horrible situation.
Someone very close to me died of cancer about a year ago, the worst part of it was not the actual death, but when the doctor had to tell us that time was limited. While I realize that a snappy song and dance number such as the one above is not necessarily the answer, being able to find the humor in a horrible situation, no matter how hard it might be, is what makes us human.
Be careful when making such broad assumptions and arriving at such harsh stereotypes. There are so many sterotypes about the homosexual community that prevent us from achieving equality, I would hope that you would think twice before making another about a group you are no longer part of. I don’t need or want any more stereotypes attached to my name as I am sure is the same for you.
Afroguapo
Sorry Godric but I stand by what I said. I didn’t say all teens relish in this type of gallows humor but that we’ve expanded the boundaries of what is permissible and socially okay where some might be desensitized to certain things. In this day and age of Sarah Silverman, Howard Stern, Don Imus, Grand Theft Auto, violent/mysogonistic rap music, Juicy Gossip, massive malicious bullying in schools, MySpace where moms pretend to be boys and cause girls to commit suicide, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out that things are considerably different from when I grew up. You confessedly found it funny — it’s subjective. I DIDN’T but also know that I am not the sole arbiter of what is and what is not funny. However, as I said previously, I’d like to see positive people weigh in on the matter and get their point of view. By the same token, I am tired of non-blacks on here telling me to chill out and get over it when they are not black. Sorry if it bothers your age demographic but I hope by way of background you could see where I was coming from.
Afroguapo
And interestingly, I noticed in your previous post, you egg Andrew on to push the envelope even more. Do you like sensationalism/controversy?
Afroguapo
As I said, I personally didn’t find it funny whereas some of you did for seemingly valid reasons (e.g., when you’re utterly powerless, you want to find the humor in a dire situation, all we have at the end is humor). This was another take on the side of those who failed to see the humor.
http://www.advocate.com/exclusive_detail_ektid19925.asp
GodricGryffindork
Afroguapo, If I am not mistaken (which I doubt I am, I am a fairly intelligent teenager) all those things you mentioned (with the exception of bullying at schools, which is another topic in itself) Sarah Silverman, Howard Stern, Don Imus, Grand Theft Auto, violent/mysogonistic rap music, Myspace, etc. were either brought on by adults or are adults.
Hate to tell you this buddy, but Grand Theft Auto, not created by the 15 year olds who play it, it was probably created by some lonely guy sitting in his basement, an adult nonetheless.
So don’t go on saying that things are fucked up now because of the teenagers “now-a-days,” because believe it or not, people don’t give two shits what teenagers think, unless it has the possibility to make them money.
As for your question on if I like controversy, yes in fact I do. I write editorials for my school newspaper and I try to create as much controversy as possible with the stories, and for a good reason I might add.
Controversy institutes change. Think about it really. I am gathering from what you said that you a black man, with out controversy, you would still be sitting on the back of the bus, however because one little old lady decided enough was enough and started some controversy, you are now free to sit wherever you so choose.
Further more, the internet is one of the last places journalists have in our current FCC controlled world to really push the envelope and give the people what they feel necessary, and if our last source of truly free media fails to do so, I honestly fear greatly for the future of this country, but again I have brought up another topic I really could go on and on for, but for now I will simply leave it at that.
Afroguapo
Godric, please don’t be so sophomoric as to denigrate the legacy of Rosa Parks by drawing an inapt analogy between the civil rights movement in relation to the Montgomery Bus boycotts and your puerile desire to read/listen to cutting edge fare by soliciting the webmaster to push the envelope (“you people make no sense to me go on Andrew, push the envelope even more!”)
While Grand Theft Auto and the other things I mentioned are made by adults, they are MARKETED and PEDALED to young adults such as yourself. No one is trying to squelch free speech or the First Amendment but to elicit various viewpoints from people. You have your opinion that this funny and I and others have the opinion that it’s not. We agree to disagree. As I said, I’d like to hear from positive people on the subject much in the same way I wouldn’t be interested in white people trying to convince me how funny or cutting edge “blackface” is.
Dawster
god, i leave for one day and all hell breaks loose.
i’m really confused here. the joke was about TELLING the person he had AIDS (not HIV, but full blown AIDS). that is a joke about the doctor… not the patient. as Godrick mentioned, that’s one of the worst parts of being a doctor.
no one was making fun of AIDS, people with AIDS, HIV, or the HIV+. that wasn’t the direction the joke went in and that wasn’t even the point of the gag.
maybe you think it’s disrespectful. that’s understandable. but there ARE some people who have a sense of humor, and there are some people who laugh in lieu of crying.
to tell you the truth, for a while i got more uncomfortable around jokes/etc. involving AIDS than my friend who actually HAS AIDS. but because he is able to laugh it is assumed he has dementia? who is really being disrespectful now? how can anyone criticize the joke above and then turn around and be equally disrespectful to someone who actually has the disease? how hypocritical.
anyone who takes life that seriously is going to take death and dying seriously. i get that. but don’t bitch or belittle those of us who have the ability to laugh. we’re not heartless. we are not void of passion. we aren’t making fun of the unfortunate. we’re enjoying ourselves while we are on this planet. my father passed away from cancer, he was telling jokes and laughing up until he slipped into a coma.
we as humans are at our most honest when we laugh. i think we should do it more… but too many people are uncomfortable with honesty, so they get “faux” indignant instead.
Afroguapo
Dawster, you are entitled to your opinion as much as those of us who didn’t find this funny are entitled to ours. I tried to put myself into this hypothetical situation and I can genuinely say if I were positive and had full blown AIDS or had even come back from the brink of it, I doubt I would find this funny. I appreciate your candor that “in dreadful desperate situations, all we have is humor” but while that works for some, it doesn’t work for others. http://www.advocate.com/exclusive_detail_ektid19925.asp
Lauren
I honestly believe there should be more humor in the world, and I find this funny.
It’s true that it could have been offensive, but I think they kept it from crossing that line from ‘humor’ to ‘offensive material’.
Nice going Andrew.
Ron
HIV+ here (not full-blown AIDS) :;
The clip was kinda funny, but not hilarious. Family Guy is an equal opportunity offender. It’s the only prime time show with a pedophile as a recurring character!
GodricGryffindork
Afroguapo I would appreciate it if you would not go o far as to insult my intelligence and use your elaborate, ornate, or otherwise ornamental words. (yes those are all from the thesaurus, I figured you would feel right at home if I used them.) And please don’t post on here about how that is not what you were trying to do, because like I said I am a fairly intelligent teenager and I am not blind to the ways of someone trying to outsmart someone else.
While yes, products such as Grand Theft Auto are being, in your somewhat barbaric terms, pedaled to those my age, once again the only reason for this is people your age, but that is really here nor there.
However what is both here and there is your ignorance towards media and the current state our countries media is in. Your statement that “No one is trying to squelch free speech or the First Amendment but to elicit various viewpoints from people.” is quite far off. We are currently in the middle of an FCC crisis that if things go as the head of the FCC plans, local media will be more condensed than ever before, providing fewer viewpoints on news stations and in newspapers, which is why the internet is really our last spot possible to get different viewpoints, and while you do seem adamant to the fact that you and I can agree to disagree, you also seem adamant on making sure that everyone does agree with you seeing as you have posted basically the same comment twice, once directed to me and once directed to Dawster. If we are able to just agree to disagree, why do you insist on bringing it up again?
souljacker
here’s another HIV+ guy who thought this was funny – not uproarious as Family Guy usually is, but giggle-worthy. i HAD full-blown AIDS – a lot of people don’t realize that you can have it and get better. I had KS, 99 T-Cells, shingles -the whole kitandkaboodle. Maybe I’m lucky, but here I am 7 years later undetectable, feeling healthy as i ever have as an adult. i KNOW i’m lucky and have the utmost empathy for those who don’t have it as well – my meds don’t make sick at all, my kidneys are in fine shape, no side effects.
i say all this because these are the things that make me able to laugh at something like this. i’ve been told i have AIDS. it wasn’t funny at all. but distance gives you perspective.
some people probably thought what Don Imus thought was funny, many didn’t. so let the people who enjoy it watch it and those who are offended turn the channel and let everyone else be. you can’t please all the people all the time – just as Rev. Wright.
kisses.
todd
Maybe the the greatest nation ever, which rolled over and allowed the theft of TWO presidential elections deserves the Family Guy! I actually find it quite funny.
Afroguapo
Godric, I bring it up again because you spoke as if you were the ultimate authority on the matter and as if your desire to push the envelope trumped ALL. Go back and read what I wrote, I said, while I didn’t find it funny, I’d like to hear other viewpoints. Humor is subjective. And sorry if you don’t like the “ornate” manner in which I present things. I am more than twice your age and don’t feel compelled to talk in any other way just to appease your age difference. It’s not to be condescending or make your arguments look stupid, and perhaps it’s ageist, but I really am not interested in being lectured to by a 17 year old upstart who tries to compare the Montgomery Bus Boycotts saying I would be still sitting in the back of a bus as akin to his desire for seeing material that might offend the sensibilities of some. Save your so-called crisis for your essays on your college applications. Souljacker, interesting that distance (in getting well again) gives some perspective. Glad you’re back from the brink and doing well and continued good health.
ggreen
Dawster:
As I said before I’m so glad you have the bill-of-fare to how we all should live and think. You living in the nation’s sphincter otherwise known as Texas it must give you exclusive insight to the nether regions of America. After reading your blog it proves the adage any one with a whine and a high opinion of their opinions can blog.
GodricGryffindork
Afroguapo, I would like to backtrack for a moment to something you said in comment number 22.
You mentioned the story about a women who pretended to be a boy on myspace which eventually lead to a young girl committing suicide. At the time I had no idea about this story so I decided to do some research on it, and I have to say that using this in your argument was quite possibly the dumbest thing you have said this entire time. You were trying to prove that todays youth is corrupted and disgusting or whatever you think may be true, however this story clearly points out the issues that Americas adults have. The women who for some deranged reason pretended to be a boy was 47 years old, 30 years older than myself and probably not far off from your age since you mention that you are more than twice my age.
I also am not sure where you get off saying that I believed that my opinion trumped all, I stated that I believe it was funny and that some people should lighten up because that is my opinion, I never once said that it was the only right opinion, just that it was mine, the same that you are doing.
And you also completely missed my analogy to the Montgomery Bus Boycotts. I believe what I was discussing was the fact that that controversy instilled change in our country, I brought up this point to answer your question of if I like controversy or not, not to say that it was the same as being able to watch a video that some may find offensive, maybe you should go back and learn a little more about reading and comprehending.
Dawster
Green (and Afroguapo for that matter), i do not care what other people think. it’s a free country, you can find things funny or not funny all you want.
my problem is whether or not you have the right to get offended. the situation is that (1) the joke wasn’t about AIDS or HIV or people living with either, (2) the person being sung to in the clip above is not mentioned or even presumed to be gay, (3) we are not HIV+ or living with AIDS ourselves.
so there is no moral ground for us to get offended. HOWEVER, if you would like to be offended on behalf of our brothers and sisters currently living with the disease, that is fine. i’m here to tell you that there are people with HIV (as posted here) who were not offended and people with AIDS (that i know) who did not take issue with the joke. therefore, there is no place for us to become indignant.
couple that, Ggreen and Afroguapo, both of you outright belittled and made fun of an ACTUAL person living with AIDS… and me for laughing at this. neither of you have apologized, neither of you even care at how hypocritical it is to be pissed at a cartoon where the disease is an irrelevant part of the joke… but it’s okay for you to speak disparaging of those who are actually living with AIDS and those that care for them.
THAT is my issue. whether or not the joke is funny is a matter of opinion. “i found it funny, everyone else can fuck off.” that is opinion. if you didn’t find it funny… that’s opinion. degrading those that have AIDS and found it funny, not apologizing, and not feeling in the least bit bad for your recorded hypocrisy… well… that is not opinion. and it’s a far worse offense than the joke above.
Afroguapo
I know full well the woman was an adult, note I said “moms” pretending to be boys. I was pointing out albeit obliquely that the Internet while a great thing and boon to mankind and technology is not without its perils and negatives such as this incident in question (the suicide), juicy gossip where you can malign people with no consequences which they will likely have at the college you’ll be attending in the fall (a Yale student recently had a porno he shot in a moment of poor judgment uploaded to the Net for all to see), or questionable fare of this kind depicted as humor for impressionable teens to see (making light of informing someone they have AIDS when we’re three decades into a disease which shows no signs of being cured). As you were the one telling people to lighten up, implicitly that suggests that they co-sign with you or get over it and lecturing in absolutes on why it was funny: “This clip is funny simply for the fact that it brings humor into a horrible situation.” You are 17 Godric and I sincerely doubt, but I admittedly could be wrong, that you have friends dealing with the disease or have had friends who have succumbed to it. I stated my stance on the subject (I personally don’t find it funny and that I don’t understand this type of humor, what can I say, some things are verboten for me) and wanted others, preferably poz, to weigh in and said several times I was not the sole arbiter. Again, please show some level of maturity and respect as you are in no position to be telling me to go back and learn anything. If my tone was strident, it’s because you came off very obnoxious and I will respond in kind when someone attempts to get smart with me.
Afroguapo
and Godric, I am 36. Excerpt from Advocate is that we draw inference he was gay: “The man is also depicted as young and sporting a goatee, possibly subtly suggesting that he is gay.” Dawster, I honestly don’t see where/how I belittled you at all, I think I addressed you perhaps once asking if you’re friend had dementia. I am truly sorry if that offended the positive people but I honestly didn’t see the humor in this.
Afroguapo
“degrading those that have AIDS and found it funny, not apologizing, and not feeling in the least bit bad for your recorded hypocrisy… well… that is not opinion. and it’s a far worse offense than the joke above.”
And speaking in hyperbole doesn’t get your point across better.
GodricGryffindork
you will never, ever tell me what my friends and loved ones suffer. you do not know me at all and you have no right to tell me that i do not have friends who suffer from this or other terrible diseases, before this i disagreed with you however i still respected you, but you have absolutely no right to assume just because i have not lived as long as you have that i do not know what pain and suffering means.
you honestly disgust me.
and as for the advocate, since when does having a goatee make you gay?
my father has a goatee along with my uncle and other heterosexual male figures i have in my life, and none of them are gay.
this is an extremely weak argument, similar to arguing if a women wears plaid or shops at Home Depot she is a lesbian.
Just because Advocate says it doesnt make it right.