Mac Cassia 2015/03/17

Hail to thee, Kamp Krusty:Depictions of Poststructuralist Anarchism in The Simpsons

(Thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of BA.Soc.Sci, University of the Fraser Valley)

Within the composite 'pastiche' reflection of contemporary society that is the Simpsons, few

recurrent themes fascinate me quite so much as their irreverent (and frequently positive) depictions of

extralegal activities such as rioting, looting, and vigilantism. In episode after episode, and in some

cases (e.g. Last Exit To Springfield) literally at the push of a button, the residents of Springfield may be

observed to go berserk en masse, wreaking untold devastation upon either the focus of their rage, or

upon their own community in the spastic throes thereof. Beneath their veneer of middle-class American

values, and patina of orderly civilization, a truly frightening beast seethes, greater in its potential of

creation and destruction than the sum totality of the constraints enforced upon their lives by modern

civilization. In these moments, when (to borrow a turn of phrase from Yeats) their collective 'ceremony

of innocence is drowned', Groening's characters may be viewed in their most raw and primal forms,

affording us by proxy a glimpse into the most uncomfortable depths of our collective sociological

condition. While Theodor Adorno once observed that “all satire is blind to the forces liberated by

decay”, speculating that this “is why total decay has absorbed the forces of satire” (Adorno, 2005, p.

211), this pitfall has apparently been negotiated by Groening et al. through a synergistic fusion of

genres within the milieu of the Springfieldian context. In keeping with Vladimir Nabokov's principle

that “satire is a lesson”, while “parody is a game” (Maxim Moshkova Library, 1967, para. 58), The

Simpsons not only acknowledges the forces liberated by decay, but seems to revel in their implicitly

satiric parody, constructing both lesson and game in their treatment of the subject while managing to

avoid explicit judgement (thus retaining a veneer of ostensible pastiche), in effect enhancing their

relatability across ideological chasms through the mechanisms of axiological plurality and semiotic

democracy, while in so doing exemplifying an entirely postmodern subgenre, that will, for the purposes

of this investigation, be henceforth termed as postsatire.

While neither the series, nor the events it depicts, may be understood accurately in terms of

absolute meaning on the basis of this axiological plurality (and resultant semiotic democracy), meaning

may be drawn from it nonetheless. As a form of mass communication, it is subject to Marshall

McLuhan's analytic precept that “the medium is the message”, and that “the personal and social

consequences of any medium - that is, of any extension of ourselves - result from the new scale that is

introduced into our affairs by each extension of ourselves” (quoted in Fang, 1997, p. 21, para. 8). If we

consider the Simpsons as an extension of ourselves, we, by equal and reciprocal extension, are subject

to the personal and social consequences of their medium. No matter how irreverent the lens through

which they refract our collective sociological whole, the source remains a true image, rendering a

profundity of irreverence in its reflexive depiction thereby. Indeed, the Simpson family have been

crafted in the image of their creator, and of his own experience within the enculturated nuclear family

of North American society. Abe, Homer, Marge, Lisa, Maggie and Patty Simpson have been named

respectively for Groening's grandfather, father, and three sisters (Vincent, 2013), while Bart (arguably

the central character of the show) was originally intended to be Groening's namesake, but was later

renamed after a minor character in The Day of the Locust (by Nathanael West), on the basis that

Groening “didn’t think it would go over well in a pitch meeting” (quoted by De La Roca, 2012, para.

2). Springfield itself has been christened after the fictional setting of the classic sitcom Father Knows

Best (Springfield, Oregon), which creator Matt Groening had delighted in as a child (and had in fact

imagined to be taking place near his own home town of Portland, ibid., para. 8), constituting in effect a

simulacra of a simulacra of ourselves.

In analyzing the discourse of this simulacra, it is clear that the spectre of civil insurgence looms

large. I have currently identified more than 52 episodes that depict instances of insurgence in varying

degrees, ranging from the imposition of vigilante justice, to looting and/or rioting, to organized civil

disobedience, acts of sabotage, armed revolution, and outright secession from the state. Specifically in

the case of these latter two methodologies, Groening has consistently associated anarchist symbology

with these actions, which may be clearly seen in episodes such as Kamp Krusty or At Long Last Leave

(both of which feature triumphant waving of the black flag, anarchism's most historically recognizable

symbol). As an ideology, however, the lens of traditional anarchism is no less exempt from its genesis

within the European enlightenment (i.e. modernity) than any other theoretical construct of this period,

rendering it in many regards a poor analytic model by which to compare a postmodern (and at times

poststructural) discourse such as that presented in The Simpsons. Accordingly, it is the intent of this

paper to analyze the discourse of civil insurgency presented within this series primarily via a

framework of poststructural anarchist (also known as ontological, or 'postanarchist') theory, which

affords (in its rejection of absolute meaning, essentialism, and reductionism in favour of axiological

plurality) an excellent vantage point from which to understand both the content of Groening's work in

this regard, and the postsatiric methodology by which it is portrayed.

While many elements of the postmodernism aesthetic, such as parodic pastiche, irony and self-

referentiality may be seen clearly to permeate the discourse, and sociological portrayals, of The

Simpsons, aesthetic may no more be exempted from this equation than medium, and is in fact as

integral to understanding the intent of any given communication. The axiological plurality and semiotic

democracy to which the series owes its success are less a product of this aesthetic than they are of the

accompanying theory which has sprung of postmodern humanity's attempts to decipher the syntagmatic

effect this aesthetic has wrought upon their collective sociocultural environment, and the mechanisms

by which it operates. In order to deconstruct the first proposition of this paper (axiological plurality)

from an analytic standpoint, it is necessary first to operationalize the basis from which meaning, and

consequently value judgement, is constructed contextually. In so doing, the second proposition of this

paper (semiotic democracy) plays a role of particular relevance. It is difficult to fathom a means by

which axiological plurality could be constructed without semiology, and in particular “semiotic

democracy” (as coined by John Fiske in Television Culture, 1987, p. 83, para. 2), which affords an

excellent analytic framework by which to understand the effects of contextual polysemy in the

formation of oppositional culture, and the mechanisms by which a spectrum of axiological plurality

may be derived in the decoding of a single text. As such, the discourse of The Simpsons will be

investigated by this paper primarily in terms of semiotic theory as it pertains to the 'postanarchist'

tendencies evident in their portrayals of civil insurgence. Furthermore, it is the contention of this paper

that through a process of mediated abstraction, the series performs a function of abstracted mediation,

signalling through the sheer prevalence of civil insurgency within this simulacrum what Raoul

Vaneigem once termed “a growing rejection of the forms which govern us”, and enabling (through the

previously-noted mechanisms of axiological plurality and semiotic democracy) “radical theory, which

is the only guarantee of the coherence of such a rejection” to penetrate “the masses by

extending their spontaneous creativity” (2012, p. 77, para. 1).

This “rejection of the forms which govern us” (ibid.) manifests itself multifariously within the

fractal universe of Groening's characters, occurring not only within the previously-noted taxonomy of

vigilante justice, looting and/or rioting, organized civil disobedience, acts of sabotage, armed

revolution, and secession from the state, but transubstantiating as legion through an overwhelming

normalization of antiauthoritarian behaviourisms within the series. Whether it be the antics of Homer

(whose rap sheet includes tax fraud, international smuggling, insurance fraud, bribery of officials,

information piracy, attempted bank robbery, escaping from prison on several occasions, and casual drug

use, as well as multiple arrests for disturbing the peace and/or assault), Bart (whose own is quite

impressive, including public indecency, theft of a police cruiser and equipment, several instances of

breaking and entering, causing an international incident, and general racketeering, including a brief

stint with the Springfield Mafia, in addition to the wide array of extralegal agit-prop mischief that

seems to be his raison d'être), Marge (who has so far been arrested for shoplifting, killing an

endangered species, assault, drug trafficking, and blockading the Springfield bridge among other

things), Lisa (whose relentless commitment to truth has landed her in jail several times), Maggie (who

once shot Mr. Burns, as well as several members of the Springfield Mafia in an unrelated incident, has

hospitalized her father by assaulting him with a weapon, and has since become arguably the most

dangerous of the Simpson clan), or any other number of characters within the show, disregard for the

letter of the law appears to have become thoroughly de rigeur amongst the residents of Springfield.

Additionally, in contrast to the 52 episodes previously noted (e.g. Kamp Krusty, At Long Last

Leave), which primarily depict civil insurgency in socioeconomic terms as a matter of extralegal

resistance from below to the external imposition of authority from above, or alternately as an eruption

of disorder between relative equals (generally fuelled by sociocultural conflict of some kind), a parallel

recurrent thematic may be observed as it pertains to the pervasive illegitimacy of authority figures

themselves within this universe. Mr. Burns, the paragon and patriarch of Springfieldian capitalism,

upon whose wallet rests the fate of the Simpson family (and indeed much of their community), has

been portrayed rigging elections, trafficking in stolen art, bribing officials, smuggling prohibited

substances across international lines, engaging in opium abuse, illegally dumping toxic waste, selling

plutonium to terrorists, ordering murders and beatings at will, and, on one occasion, robbing the United

States Government of no less than one trillion dollars. Conspicuously, he has also since been revealed

to have served in the Waffen SS during WWII, and manufactured munitions shells for the 'third reich',

despite having simultaneously served as a private in Abe Simpson's army unit (after having been busted

down to this rank from that of officer for 'obstructing a probe from J. Edgar Hoover', and during which

time he foils an attempted assassination of Hitler), not only clearly associating his character (and thus

by extension the values that he embodies) with fascism, but also raising a very real possibility that

Burns may, in fact, be a war criminal to boot. Mayor Quimby, the series' most frequently-featured

representative of municipal authority, is little better, doing regular business with Springfield's mafia,

bribing witnesses and jurors to rig trials, growing marijuana (at this point a prohibited substance) in his

closet, leveraging his position to sleep with a different woman nearly every night (27 of which liaisons have

so far resulted in paternity suits), embezzling taxpayer dollars with which to fund the murder of his political

enemies, and accepting bribes as a matter of business so thoroughly and consistently as for the seal on the

wall of his office to read “Corruptus in Extremis” (or 'extremely corrupt'); nor are Springfield's police, who

are alternately portrayed as a corrupt, incompetent, ineffectual, apathetic, arbitrary and generally

detrimental presence in the community, and the chief of whom (who accepts monthly kickbacks from

Quimby in exchange for his compliance) has, in a stroke of intertextual brilliance, been modelled after

the gangster characters played by Edward G. Robinson in such classics as Little Caesar (1931), and

Key Largo (1948), layered with distinctly porcine visual overtones that have become somewhat of a

running gag in the series.

It appears that despite The Simpsons' embedded context within a framework of legally-enforced

power relations (mirroring our own by extension in their conception as a simulacra thereof), the

exercise of agency by its constituent characters accords little respect thereto voluntarily. Viewed

through a lens of anarchist theory, this abject disregard for the tenets of law is entirely consistent with

its positionality as an imposed external authority. As Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (the first person known to

have referred to their beliefs as 'anarchist') once stated in regards to the subject of law:

“I stand ready to negotiate, but I want no part of laws: I acknowledge none: I protest against every order with which some authority may feel pleased on the basis of some alleged necessity to over-rule my free will. Laws! We know what they are and what they are worth. Gossamer for the mighty and the rich, fetters that no steel could smash for the little people and the poor, fishing nets in the hands of government” (quoted in Guérin, 2005, p. 103, para. 3).

Given the magnitude of the crimes committed by Springfield's “mighty” and “rich” (i.e. Burns,

Quimby, Wiggum et al.), and the fact that these crimes continued to be committed with near impunity,

it would be eminently accurate to conceive of law as “gossamer” in relation to their positionality, easily

wiped aside and offering little impediment. In the case of the Simpson family (i.e. 'the little people and

the poor'), each one of whom have been arrested, if not incarcerated, at least once over the course of the

show, the analogy of law to “fetters that no steel could smash” is equally apt. In the case of their

relation to the “hands of government” (e.g. the aforementioned ruling elite, or any number of federal

agents that have appeared in the series), Proudhon's final characterization rings true as well. Both

Homer and Bart, the male protagonists of the show, have repeatedly been the subject of elaborate

schemes utilized by the authoritarian state apparatus (or 'hands of government') either to entrap them

(much as one would catch fish in 'fishing nets'), or to force them by coercion into luring bigger 'fish'

into these 'nets' (which may be seen in episodes such as The Trouble With Trillions, The Seven-Beer

Snitch, and The Debarted). In light of this realization, it follows logically that the manner in which

legality is portrayed by The Simpsons is, in fact, consistent with that of anarchist theory, and

furthermore, it must be noted for the purposes of discourse analysis that the cognitive dissonance

between syntax and paradigm exhibited within the series is also entirely consistent with the concept of

what anarchists such as Mikhail Bakunin, Johann Most, Emma Goldman, Alexander Berkman, Clément

Duval, Gustav Landauer, Luigi Galleani, Severino Di Giovanni, and Errico Malatesta have referred to

as 'propaganda of the deed' (if not, in certain instances, the associated 'illegalism' later exemplified by

individuals such as Jules Bonnot, Horst Fantazzini or Lucio Urtubia).

While the explicit syntax of the series presumes a 'legitimacy' (or at least primacy) of the

coercive hierarchic state, the fundamental conflict of this syntactic element with the behavioural

paradigm evidently accepted as doxa by both the altern and subaltern of Springfieldian society belies a

fundamental contradiction of modern life. As citizens, we are conditioned to believe that we are

governed by consent (thereby imputing a similarly illegitimate legitimacy to the coercive hierarchic

authoritarian methodology by which this model operates), yet no legal mechanism exists within the

modern nation-state of renouncing one's consent to be governed, nor, for that matter, is it necessary

within this framework for an individual to consent to (or even have knowledge of) the laws that have

been imposed upon the geopolitic region in which they reside before these laws can be enforced upon

them. Divorced from meaningful consent in this manner, authority thus becomes little more than

primacy, more akin to the dominance exercised by regional warlords, or organized crime syndicates,

than that of any reasonable, sane system, let alone the democracy which the modern nation-state

systematically presents itself as in the farce which has come to be known as global politics in the early

21st century. In the multiplicit manifestation of extralegal resistance to this imposed external authority

which has thus far been demonstrated in The Simpsons, regardless of any explicit dialogue or portrayal

to the contrary, lies a fundamental implicit statement of this authority's rejection. Evidenced in its

complete disregard by the vast majority of Springfield's residents lies a statement both of its irrelevance

on an interpersonal level, and the artificiality of its imposition, on the basis that the 'human nature' of

the characters in The Simpsons (as depicted primarily via their actions on the series) appears to run

overwhelmingly contradictory to the behaviour proscribed under said authority. While Springfield's

residents “stand ready to negotiate” the legal syntax imposed upon their daily lives on an explicit

textual level, subtextually it is clear from the ease, and indeed eagerness, with which they

paradigmatically transgress this restrictive framework that they “want no part of laws”, and indeed

“acknowledge none” in any meaningful sense, protesting (via the propaganda of their deed) “against

every order with which some authority may feel pleased on the basis of some alleged necessity to over-

rule” their “free will” (in the words of Proudhon, as quoted in Guérin, 2005, p. 103, para. 3).

In the world of The Simpsons, just as in ours, it may be observed on this basis that, from a

socioeconomic perspective (as anthropologist Neal Keating once stated of modern society):

“Everywhere the fight goes on, to get people to respect property, and to accept the miseries that come with such respect, such as work, destitution, and injustice. It is an endless fight by necessity. The minute it ceases, or weakens [...], people break out into activities of an altogether different nature. Theyriot, and they loot. They relieve things of their fixed commodity values” (1994, p. 3, para. 1).

The syntax of private property is clearly evident throughout the series, as is the sociocultural paradigm

opposing this. Furthermore, as Keating rightly notes, “the redistribution of these relieved things does

not take the form of a sale, nor even a trade”, on which basis “without a fixed price, they can only be

considered as gifts”, a sentiment perhaps best summed up by the series in the following exchange (in

Poppa's Got A Brand New Badge, the finale of the series' thirteenth season) between the characters of

Lenny and Carl, upon having accidentally crashed their cars through the plate glass window of Costington's,

a high-end department store located in downtown Springfield:

Lenny: I don't hear an alarm. Let's take stuff!

Carl: Hey, whoa... isn't that stealing?

Lenny: No, it's just looting.

Carl: Sweet! Let's go nuts!

Upon clarifying this critical distinction (which apparently negates any ethical dilemma that may have

arisen from this situation for the characters involved), both Lenny and Carl commence looting the store

with enthusiasm, only to be joined near-instantaneously by passers-by, as well as various residents of

Springfield who have gathered at the scene of the accident. At the slightest faltering of the coercive

hierarchic state's mechanisms of control (i.e. a power failure, which in this case has disabled the

capitalist hegemony's primary method of enforcing respect for private property, the store's alarm), the

people of Springfield may be observed, yet again, to (as Keating has noted) naturalistically seize upon

this weakening of the monolithic authoritarian culture imposed upon their lives, breaking out “into

activities of an altogether different nature” (i.e. rioting and looting) given the slightest opportunity, and

relieving “things of their fixed commodity values” en masse in direct defiance of legality. As the lyrics

of the music which accompany this “grand maxwa” (Keating, 1994, p. 10, para. 3) state:

“All around, people looking half dead/ Walking on the sidewalk, hotter than a match head/ But at night it's a different world”(The 'Lovin' Spoonful', 1966, Summer In The City).

For the purposes of analysis, the store alarm of Costington's in this episode may also be quite

accurately interpreted as an extension of the Foucauldian panopticon, on the basis of its surveillance

functionality (i.e. ostensibly alerting the police (who constitute the hand of the capitalist state by which

this technology is employed, to enforce the regulatory norms of this regime by force upon its breach), a

concept which has been recurrent throughout the series in multifarious forms, although perhaps

nowhere as explicitly as in To Surveil With Love, which constitutes to date perhaps the series' most

intensive exploration of surveillance society. In this episode, following a terrorism scare (which results

from an incident in which Smithers and Mr. Burns dispose of radioactive waste by concealing it in

Homer's gym bag), civil liberties are summarily suspended in Springfield by its ruling elite (in a move

that closely parallels the adoption of the 'Patriot Act' by the United States Government), and an invasive

panopticon of surveillance cameras is forced upon the residents of Springfield (paralleling the

surveillance under which American citizens have been placed following the adoption of this legislation

by their government). Shortly after its installation, the Springfield police become bored with watching

the endless feed of peoples daily activity, and Chief Wiggum (proclaiming that he 'can't take another

minute of these stupid screens') orders officers Lou and Eddie to go and “find some concerned citizens

to pick up the slack”, thereby crowdsourcing the panopticon, and in effect creating a sociological prison

wherein the inmates serve also as guards (a proposition which the author of this paper would argue strongly

analogous to the If You See Something, Say Something™ campaign enacted by the U.S.

Department of Homeland Security the same year as this episode's release, or any number of the

crowdsourced surveillance initiatives which have been enacted by the North American ruling elite since

that time). The “concerned citizens” which they recruit in this venture (including Marge, Dr. Hibbert,

the Van Houtens, Smithers, Mrs. Hoover and Helen Lovejoy) quickly abandon the project as the

ethically dubious implications of its implementation become apparent, leaving in their place as they

abandon their posts that lone stalwart of Springfieldian moral enterpreneurialship, Ned Flanders,

buoyed up by his slightly insane self-perception in this role as a “Jiminy Cricket for the whole ding-

dang town” that “knows what's best for everybody”. Driven by the pervasive intrusion of this

surveillance upon the privacy of their daily lives (and by Flanders' constant nagging through the P.A.

system attached to these surveillance cameras) Homer and Bart soon find a blind spot (conveniently

enough, in their backyard) beyond the prying eyes of state surveillance, and establish what can only be

described as a 'Temporary Autonomous Zone' (or T.A.Z.) in the terminology of 'Hakim Bey' (a.k.a.

Peter Lamborn Wilson), who first coined the term 'post-anarchism' in his 1987 treatise, Post-anarchism

Anarchy, and remains perhaps best well-known for his advocacy of this former concept, owing to its

popularization amongst proponents of early 'rave' and 'teknival' culture, which sought to suspend the

application of societal norms periodically within defined events. This T.A.Z. is eventually discovered

by Flanders, and the resulting confrontation between himself and Homer, uncharacteristically, is

resolved in a positive and mutually cooperative manner, which climaxes in Homer and Ned (similarly

uncharacteristically) working together to destroy the surveillance infrastructure of the state, in blatant

defiance of legality, with rocks, shotguns, and flaming crossbow bolts among other implements.

The coup de grace of Groening's paradigmatically poststructured anarchism (and what I

personally consider the zenith of the series), however, was not to come until 39 episodes later, in their

record-breaking 500th episode, At Long Last Leave, which the creative team ironically dubbed their

“most meaningless milestone of all”. In stark contrast to previous episodes, which had portrayed

resistance to imposed authority either via spontaneous outbursts of illegalism, or propaganda of the

deed in the forms of coordinated rioting, politicized vandalism and/or vigilantism, and outright

revolutionary tactics (which are most evident in episodes such as Kamp Krusty, or A Tale Of Two

Springfields), the events depicted in this entry abandon the previous tactic of critique via implicit

criticism (which had thus far enabled the mechanisms of axiological plurality and semiotic democracy

upon which their success had been built), opting instead to present an amusing, yet thoroughly blunt

take on the subject which leaves little room for misinterpretation of its intent. Banished from

Springfield city limits for their flagrant violation and disregard of its regulatory norms (i.e. Homer's

'drunken shenanigans', which are estimated at this point to have caused $8.3 million in property

damage, Bart's 'pranks', which 'dwindle in humour as they rise in destruction', and Lisa's 'environmental

initiatives', which are 'not that expensive but pretty annoying') by the consensus of a meeting held

without their knowledge, the Simpson clan (fleeing the 'pelt bounty' placed on their heads in a darkly

humorous nod to the 'scalp bounties' historically placed on the heads of Indigenous Peoples by the

colonial state) soon inadvertently stumble upon “an off-the-grid, unincorporated settlement” of those

“rejected by society”. Known only as 'the Outlands', this community (which the Simpsons are adopted

by, and soon come to call home), can only be described sociopolitically as anarchist in its intentional

absence of rules or regulations. Despite the lack of social, and in particular, technological infrastructure

that such an off-the-grid model necessarily entails, Homer, Bart, Lisa and Maggie soon thrive in this

environment, much like fish in water. To hammer home this point, Groening invokes, for the second

time (the first, as previously noted, being in Kamp Krusty), the black flag, and going so far to get his

point across this time as to have emblazoned it with the infamous 'circle-A', or 'anarchy sign' as it is

contemporarily known, which symbolizes the synergistic concept that “anarchy is order” (as expressed by

Anselme Bellegarigue, quoted in Woodcock, 1962, p. 276, para. 1, and derived from an earlier quotation by

Proudhon in his 1849 work The State), in addition to the extraneous (and humorously ironic) motto

“anarchy rules”. The lone holdout of the family is Marge, who expresses feelings of homesickness after

meeting their new neighbour, Julian Assange (who, as she states, is 'no Flanders'). In an effort to assuage the

discomfort of his wife, Homer sneaks her, and himself, back into Springfield, defying their legal

banishment. After being caught in this ruse, and threatened at gunpoint by the Springfield police, however,

Marge abandons her nostalgia, and after having escaped with their lives, the pair return to their anarchistic

new home, only to be followed by a flood of Springfield's residents seeking a “better way of life”. Soon,

their “new Eden” has become a bustling hub of activity as these relocating residents erect homes and

businesses, replicating the trappings of their daily lives within this sociopolitic clime. In short, despite the

infringement of 'the grid' (i.e. social and technological infrastructure) upon the Outlands' geographic

boundaries which this influx creates, it appears that Springfield is well on its way to restructuring itself as

the functional, decentralized antiauthoritarian civilization that anarchism aspires to be, not through

revolution (as the classical tenets of anarchist theory proscribe) overthrowing the state, but through the

unitary secession of groups formed through voluntary association, governed by dialogic consensus, and

devoid of proscribed ideology or axiological universality (acknowledging implicitly, as Vanegeim states,

that “revolutionary ideology is radical theory co-opted by the rulers”; 2012, p. 77, para. 1), from this state in

keeping with the theoretic principles of postructural anarchism, constituting (in Vanegeim's terminology) a

“supersession by the poetry of action” over “the historical crisis of language” in “the great game over signs”

(ibid.).

Those who would make their living by governing others, however, are inevitably drawn to herds of

sufficient size to line their pockets with fleece, and Springfield's ruling elite are no exception to this rule.

While neither Burns nor Wiggum (representing the twin oppressions of capitalism and the police state

respectively) feature in the finale of this episode, the easier targets of Mayor Quimby (representing 'corrupt

city government'), and Superintendent Chalmers (representing 'a school system that teaches to the tests,

sneaks the kids the answers and still fails') are soon found skulking about the outskirts of the settlement,

begging for admittance. Despite Marge's protestations “this is [or represents, from a perspective of

discourse analysis] everything we've put behind us”, the rest of the family apparently acquiesce, and the

archetypally inevitable fulcrum of the sitcom begins to tip, initiating a pendulous descent towards the state

of perceived 'normalcy' in which the show began as this final, fatal decision dooms those who have fled the

coercive hierarchic authoritarian state to its replication, and Springfield, in effect, is relocated for the second

time (since Trash Of The Titans, in which they are forced to flee the accumulated pollution which has

resulted from their rampant consumerism). In contrast to the enacted praxis of groups such as the Zapatistas

(who strongly embody the ideals and methodologies of poststructural anarchism), through sheer ignorance

and/or apathy the residents of Groening's simulacra accept the 'one no' of externally imposed authority, the

singular prohibition of this worldview, which stands in counterpoint to the 'many yeses' implicit to its

rejection of proscriptive ideology and axiological universality, and their “new Eden” is doomed to the

vicious cycle of Weber's 'iron cage', not through rationality, but lack of informed, militant opposition.

Indeed, the closest to the latter evidenced in the finale of this episode is Sideshow Mel's penultimately (and

tellingly) self-contradictory mock rationalization that “you can't leave civilization”, on the entirely pathotic

basis that “humanity is an inexorable upward march... or was until the year 2000”, invoking the very

modernity against which the show so valiantly struggles as a self-negating argument, and rendering the

illusion of necessity (upon the coat-tails of which the coercive hierarchic state rides) exposed for just that.

“Power can’t be overthrown like a government. The united front against authority covers the whole extent of everyday life and engages the vast majority of men. To know how to live is to know how to fightagainst renunciation without ever giving an inch. Let nobody underestimate power’s skill in stuffing itsslaves with words to the point of making them the slaves of its words” (Vaneigem, 2012, p. 77, para. 4).

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