Satire In Spongebob Squarepants

In the popular cartoon Spongebob Squarepants, the writers of the show often use satire to express serious problems, through jokes that kids don’t often catch onto. The problem with this, though, is that the episodes that satirize the most important subjects, are often the ones that receive the most backlash. Many of parents believe that although their child won't pick up on the heavy content, those real world problems should not be present in their child's cartoon. A major satire tool used in SpongeBob is a hyperbole. In the episode MuscleBob Buffpants, Spongebob tries to fit in with his weightlifter friends by gaining a lot of arm muscle in a short amount of time. When this fails, he purchases inflatable arms to make himself seem buffer. This use of the comically large fake arms satirizes those
In the episode Spongebob, You’re Fired, the writers once again rely on the use of hyperboles to satirize unemployment, and the struggle to find job. In this episode, Spongebob is fired from the Krusty Krab as a result of budget cuts. This leads him on a journey to a humourous amount of fast food places to find a job, over exaggerating how hard it is to find a job. This represents the real life struggle that people face to find jobs while unemployed. As a result of this episode, the audience can see that although unemployment seems to be fun, allowing you to stay at home and lounge around all day, it is unrealistic to think that it is possible to go without a job. Another satirical technique used in Spongebob is the use of parody. Episodes of the show often use parodies of real life situations to make fun of things or people. An example of this comes across in the episode Texas. In this episode, Sandy Cheeks, an underwater squirrel is homesick, missing the open air of Texas. Trying to get Sandy to feel better, Spongebob plans a surprise party for her, using numerous creative ways to try and get her there. One