The Release Of ‘The Interview’ Is A “Human Rights Issue”

Seth Rogan joined the ‘Real Time with Bill Maher’ panel on November 22nd to – in part – promote his new movie ‘The Interview,’ which relies on a simple storyline regurgitating some of Rogan’s previous themes: two stoners tasked with assassinating the North Korean dictator, Kim Jung-un. With a ripe, politically charged plot like this, Maher commented that the ‘politically correct mob’ has their pistols cocked and ready to defame any comic who encroaches on sensitive issues. Maher has been the brunt of these recent attacks, but Rogan responded by saying:

“I don’t find that at all, it’s so funny, I mean, we made a whole movie essentially making fun of Christianity with ‘This is the End’…I think some people who get labeled as comics who are like, ‘Ooh, the political correct community is condemning me,’ forget that they also have to be funny. And I think that when your shit is funny, people are much more willing to accept an idea that they themselves might find horribly offensive.”

While making fun of Christianity hasn’t been politically incorrect since the early 20th century, Rogan’s increasingly edgy stoner-comedy has been pulled from its Christmas 2014 release date due to a series of terror threats against theaters as North Korean officials declared it “an act of war.” Chief editor of ‘Freedom of Speech Mag,’ Benedict Sherwood, hurled the first stone when the film was announced earlier this year:

“We waged a multi-platform blitzkrieg against this blatant propaganda-piece. We took to Twitter, Vine, and Facebook to make sure people knew what they were supporting. The film subtly presumes America should abide by this ‘big stick’ philosophy in destroying any form of government other than our own, and that’s the kind of ethnocentrism we need to silence. It goes against everything [Freedom of Speech Magazine] believes.”

Sherwood’s last campaign, ‘Dog is God Backwards’ helped raise our awareness of the dogs housed in shelters by shaming owners of purebreds at local dog parks. This time he’s organized several protests wherein political activists dressed as Kim Jung-un gathered at Sony Studios’ Culver City location, pouring buckets of blood on employees’ vehicles and expressing solidarity with the North Korean leader with signs like “Kim Jung-unite” and rally cries of “End the Fed” and “Close the wage gap.” We caught up with Sherwood’s assistant and Twitter activist, Marshall Strouse, who set down his megaphone to explain the cause:

“This is really a human rights issue, just like we used capitalism to rationalize banana republics, Hollywood follows suit by bashing a people’s culture just for being different. Sure, the North Koreans are generally misinformed via censorship and have been led by a messianic dictator who’d rather build defenses than feed his own people, but have we even stopped to ask ourselves this simple question: Are the North Koreans happy? If they haven’t spoken out, we have to assume they are, and we can’t resort to this American imperialism couched in satire.”

When asked whether or not there should be a ‘line’ in comedy, Strouse replied:

“There absolutely needs to be a line. We campaigned against ‘Harold and Kumar: Escape from Guantanamo Bay’ for making light of torture, but if we don’t stand up against this misuse of free speech, what’s next? A satirical murder-mystery based on a Muslim woman whose burka masks her identity, making the detective work near impossible? Is that funny to you?”

Strouse has since been fired from his position at ‘Freedom of Speech Mag’ for his hypothetical murder-mystery plot.