D’oh!
Homer Simpson is the most moral character on the Simpsons.
There, I said it. And now I feel much better.
Frankly I have had enough of the shows fans insisting on the moral superiority of Lisa Simpson, Homer’s whiny daughter.
Look at how Homer treats Lisa. When Lisa wants a pony and Homer buys her one, he works two jobs to pay for it. Homer is seen working at the Kwik-E-Mart at night immediately after getting off work at the nuclear power plant. The man sleeps for 10 minutes a day to provide this gift for his daughter.
When she eventually gives up the pony because of the stress it’s putting on her dad and Homer gives her a pony ride out of the store, Apu remarks “He slept, he stole, he was rude to the customers. Still, there goes the best damned employee a convenience store ever had.”
This does not meant that Lisa is without conviction. She is undoubtedly a character with a strong backbone and the will to stand up for a cause, no matter what that cause is.
But she does this without regard for the feelings of her family members.
Take the episode where Lisa tricks Homer into letting her take the bus to the museum downtown. She knows Marge won’t let her go alone, so she tricks Homer into letting her. Lisa then gets horribly lost because, after all, she is a second grader. Who goes looking for her as soon as he realizes his mistake?
That’s right: Homer.
And when Lisa calls Homer a “Baboon” over and over and over again because he doesn’t understand her, who goes looking for her?
That’s right: Homer.
And he does all of this while she lords her superior intellect over him.
I could go on and on about this. But it is for reasons like these that I actively root for bad things to happen to Lisa. Bad things are always funnier when they happen to other people, but they are even more funny when they happen to other people who deserve it. Typically, when bad things happen to Lisa, she deserves it.
But there are other people in the family as well.
When he breaks his jaw and can’t talk, Homer learns to listen. And with Marge’s insistence, he gives up his wild and reckless ways and mellows out. But Marge finds him too boring and enters a demolition derby to relieve the boredom, forcing Homer back down his moral yet reckless track again. Or when they go on a marriage retreat, Homer throws a huge fish back into the lake to prove to Marge that he loves her.
When Bart and Homer build a soapbox racer and lose, Bart gets the opportunity to trade teams and race the car of his friend, Martin Prince. He turns his back on his father and the car they built together. But who shows up at the final race?
That’s right: Homer.
And Maggie? Well, Homer loves Maggie.
And look at how Homer interacts within the community. When faced with a growing crime problem and lack of confidence in the Springfield Police Department, he creates SpringShield and eventually takes over police duties for the city. He even arrested famous mob boss Fat Tony (real name Mariam).
But when the gangsters announce they will kill Homer at noon the next day, no one in town is man enough to stand beside Homer (except Flanders, who doesn’t count). Thankfully Maggie is a crack shot with a rifle, or Homer would’ve died on his front lawn.
Of course, Homer is not without his flaws, no human being is. But it is in his dealings with these flaws that the real man is revealed: a man who loves his family, cares about his community and desperately wants to win the respect of his children. He works his 9-5 job five days a week and manages to provide everything his family could want (minus cable TV).
Is it any wonder that I base my life around his teachings?
Adam Jardy is a senior in journalism and editor-in-chief of The Lantern. He wishes to state that the second coolest character behind Homer is Maggie and is eagerly awaiting responses arguing against his claim in this column.
