Fans Are Petitioning To Get SpongeBob’s Controversial Episode Unbanned
There's a petition floating around trying to get the recently banned Spongebob Squarepants episode back up and running on Nickelodeon
This article is more than 2 years old
Spongebob Squarepants has seemed to always have just a bit of controversy attached to it since it came around more than a decade ago. But 13 seasons of a very popular, and somewhat polarizing, cartoon will have its moments and there are some issues going on with the show right now. Namely, a couple of popular episodes have been removed from the rotation by Nickelodeon for a couple of different reasons. But some fans aren’t having it and there’s a Change.org petition circulating right now to have the episodes re-aired. We’ll see if the voices of the people can help sway the decision-making folks at the network.
As of right now the Change.org Spongebob Squarepants petition is sitting at *only* 50 signatures though for recording purposes that represents half of what the originators are looking for. Let’s get to 100 baby! Though several episodes were removed by Nickelodeon, the petition is specifically seeking for “Mid-life Crustacean” to get back into the mix. The station had taken it out of episode lineup following an independent audit that pointed out some problematic pieces of the story line. The main issue was the suggestion for Mr. Krabs, who is going through the titular mid-life crisis to engage in a panty raid as something that could cheer him up.
Sure, the results of the panty raid don’t go his way, he breaks into his mother’s house after all, but it was enough for Nickelodeon and Paramount+ to stop the episode from airing. They thought it was setting the wrong example when it came to, I suppose, breaking and entering as well as objectifying women over their clothes. Whatever the exact reasoning, the Spongebob Squarepants episode is not coming back even if this petition tries to make the case for keeping the episode around.
Among other things they cite on Change.org is that the Spongebob Squarepants audience is comprised of more than a few adults who enjoyed the episode. The suggestion is for Nickelodeon to simply bump up the rating and give folks a warning ahead of time rather than removing it altogether. There’s also an argument made in the petition text that some Spongebob episodes have engaged in behavior far, far worse than what happens in “Mid-life Crustacean”. I’m not sure, from an argumentative dialogue point of view, this is the best tact for getting a show back on the air. Seems like, if anything, it would call for a stricter review of the show. But heck, I didn’t put this thing out there in the universe.
Spongebob Squarepants has been around for 13 seasons and 265 episodes now, making it one of the longer-running animated programs out there. It’s also spawned three movies as well which have totaled more than $460 million dollars at the box office. So there’s no shortage of Spongebob content out there to enjoy even if a couple of episodes were taken out of rotation. But enough fan uproar could have Nickoldeon changing their minds and putting it out there for a select audience.
