So why is 75 percent of America tuning out the Oscars? Let's ask the South Park guys!

While I'm not a huge South Park fan myself (click here and then scroll down to read James Lileks' early take on it, which works for me as well), I'm glad that there's a show on that's willing to take on liberal shibboleths--and receive a huge cult following in the red states as a result.

Which is why Hollywood, Interrupted's authors interviewed Matt Stone and Trey Parker, the men who created the show for their book. They have a great take on why Hollywood has increasingly alienated much of Middle America. Here's but a small excerpt:

TP: People in the middle of the country do not matter AT ALL to the entertainment people in LA and New York. People in the entertainment industry are by and large whore-chasing drug-addict f***-ups, right? But they still believe they’re better than the guy in Wyoming who really loves his wife and takes care of his kids and is a good, outstanding, wholesome person. Hollywood views regular people as children, and they think they’re the smart ones who need to tell the idiots out there how to be.

HI: PC Hollywood treats regular people like children, but also doesn’t believe they can understand or appreciate smart jokes or irony.

MS: We see that all the time…in Hollywood, there’s a whole feeling that they have to protect Middle America from itself We can all laugh at Jew jokes and gay jokes, and I can make a black joke because I’m enlightened here in Hollywood, but don’t put that on TV because when people in Nebraska hear it, they’re going to yell the ‘N word’ at the next black person. Political correctness started from there, with the idea that the middle of the country can’t handle sophisticated jokes. And that’s why ‘South Park’ was a big bit up front, because it doesn’t treat the viewer like a f***ing retard.

This phase of Hollywood began, I'd say, in the late 1980s or early 1990s. Michael Medved would probably argue that Hollywood began alienating its audience much earlier than that. But I don't mind "adult themes"; I'd just prefer knowing that it's reciprocated amongst the filmmakers and myself.