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Recap / South Park S 21 E 3 Holiday Special

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Original air date: 9/27/2017

Randy launches a one man campaign to have Columbus Day cancelled because of the controversy surrounding the figure and goes to extreme lengths to do it. Meanwhile, the boys don't want to lose their day off from school and try to figure out how to stop him.

This episode contains examples of:

  • Ambiguous Situation: It's never revealed why Randy used to be obsessed with Christopher Columbus..
  • Amusing Injuries: Randy falls to the ground after the Columbus statue is taken down, yet he's still no worse for the wear the next scene.
  • Ass Shove: Two people from DNAandMe forcibly take a rectal sample of Randy's DNA.
  • Blatant Lies: The description of this episode in most viewing platforms is that it's a forbidden love story between a white man and a Native American man, when it's really anything but. That is to say, there is such a love story, but it's not forbidden, and strictly one-sided.
  • Breather Episode: After two straight episodes dealing with Cartman and Heidi, this episode carries little to no continuity with any other episode this season. Heidi also does not appear nor is mentioned in the episode.
  • Call-Back: Cartman's perception of Columbus Day is just as selfish as his take on Christmas in "Mr. Hankey's Christmas Classics."note 
  • Compressed Vice: At no point in the actual 2013 episodes is Randy or anyone else obsessed with Columbus.
  • Continuity Nod:
    • When the boys try threatening Peter Galtman into not cancelling the holiday while wearing masks, Kenny uses his Mysterion voice.
    • Kyle mentions that Sheila has gone on misguided crusades in the past, and recommends that Stan use reverse psychology on Randy.
  • Continuity Snarl: Kyle mentions his mom never tried to cancel a holiday. Clearly he forgot her attempt to ruin Christmas in season 1.
  • Double Standard: Galtman refuses to watch videos on the internet because of all the "fake news". However, if someone films the video using a camera and ports it to a videocassette for him to watch, then it's A-OK.
  • Exact Words: The boys never mentioned anything about it being potentially leaked to the internet, and chose an old format just to get Galtman to watch it.
  • Hypocrite: We can infer why Randy is obsessed with Christopher Columbus. He's white, and he's preoccupied with using his influence over others to get his way. It's the very thing he blames Columbus for, yet he exploited a Native American in an attempt to justify playing the victim, which would be using power to manipulate people anyway.
  • Laser-Guided Karma: Randy attempts to exploit a Native American in order to fudge a DNA test, justify removing Columbus Day from the school holiday calendar, and make an excuse for acting like a member of a victimized minority. It backfires when staffers from the company which analyzes the DNA test show up and forcibly take a rectal DNA sample from Randy.
  • Malaproper: Randy continually says "indigenous" when he means "indignant". The closest anyone comes to correcting him is a man all the way at the end of the episode who asks if he knows what indigenous means - he still doesn't actually tell Randy he's wrong.
  • N-Word Privileges: During the DNA and Me commercial, a white guy who finds out he's 2.1% black gets to say the n word without being in trouble. And yes, he says it on screen.
  • Take That!:
    • To Caucasian people whose ancestry includes a small amount of historically oppressed groups that is not visibly noticeable, but decide to play the victim card anyway. One of them is a very white guy who says the N-word and doesn't get in much trouble for it.
    • By extension, to people who play the victim card over historical events that hold little-to-no relevance in the modern world. Especially getting offended by holidays and statues.
    • Also by extension, people who think that whether or not a given person is oppressed or a victim of society is a question of that person's race, or ethnic background, rather than the actual circumstances of their life.
    • To people who think negative traits about generally-beloved historical figures (and holidays, etc.) reflect upon people who like them in modern times, or even people who don't care one way or the other.
    • Randy also drops a Take That! towards modern discourse in general, mentioning that subtlety is dead and you have to go way overboard with things to not be dismissed offhandedly.
    • Peter Galtman and his wife are also ones to people who take "Fake News" too seriously, as well as people who actually believe that New Media Are Evil.
  • Too Dumb to Live: Randy standing on top of the Columbus statue that was going to be taken down. It's only due to Plot Armor that Randy wasn't killed or injured.
  • Too Many Halves: Randy turns out to be 43% Northern European, 37% Mediterranean, 18% Southwest Asian, and 2.8% Neanderthal — that's 100.8%.
  • What Happened to the Mouse?: Randy is not recognized by anyone as the host of "White People Renovating Houses" at any point in this episode, and he and Sharon are not shown working on the show at all. This is unusual, given the last three seasons' increased focus on continuity.
  • You Keep Using That Word: Someone asks Randy if he knows what "indigenous" means after the latter mistakes it for "indignant" one too many times during his speech at the end of the episode.

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