It’s important to remember that when competent lampooning is used for social commentary, they’re not targeting one side or another, they’re pointing out an absurdity that they hope will make most people laugh at themselves as much as it makes them laugh at others. No one is spare, no one is signed-out but all are invited to see themselves as maybe others see them.
Take the Simpson’s episode on Catholicism. Plenty of shots at some stereotypical Roman Catholic themes (many of which the RC has itself acknowledged as an error of a previous era). But there is just as much lampoon directed at absurd misconceptions of the RC. In that episode, just as much parody of several Protestant assumptions. Just as much parody of those who reject religion for half-baked reasons. And across more episodes, a stern poke at absurdities across the spectrum.

For example, I’m a professor. I thought Animal House was a laugh riot, maybe more so for the parts that were a little close to home, Maybe because I’d like those things to be better than they are. I was also an Army officer. Stripes, Private Benjamin, MASH (the movie more than the series) and many others made my sides ache, and a great deal of it was the relief that the absurdities that I’d seen with my own eyes were made light n humor, and maybe made less common by exposure! I consider universities, the Army, Christianity, etc. to be foundational in my life, and I consider those institutions to be MORE healthy by having a laugh at themselves, and at the same time using the occasion for some less-burdened introspection and to subtly acknowledge some things that were previously not possible to discuss.

I find that while I want to laugh when those I disagree with are lampooned, just as often I laugh misty more joy when my own sacred cows are offered up. The end result is that I end up with a more nuanced, more circumspect perspective.

I’m not just talking about the Simpsons, obviously. From Shakespeare to Calvin and Hobbs, to Saturday Night Live, to Mark Twain, to Monty Python, the list goes on.

Lampooning, done well, that doesn’t seek to harm, that has an even hand, can arguably bridge differences that would otherwise divide, and can Bowen topics that were previously avoided.

In other words, if there’s no side taken, there’s no agenda propagated, if the humorists present themselves for a laugh as well, then it’s a basic form of healing witnessed in families, tribal cultures, and every great civilization. Admittedly, lousy families, bad cultures, corrupt organizations have a strict prohibition on parody that challenges authority. I’d say the prohibition should only be on parody that goes after the weak, the mocked the marginalized, etc.

In healthy parody there’s just a hyperbolic portrayal of a societal circumstance (that would never lampoon the innocent, defenseless or downtrodden) making sport of entrenched positions, while relieving some of the weight on the issues, so that we might better see, and using humor to smuggle some broader views into our heads for the moment they have us listening before we tune it out.

Humor, parody and lampoon nave a long history of bridging differences and intransigence by the healing power of laughter. It need not be derisive. It should not create scapegoats. Not when done in the manner good parody is done. And it might offer a spoonful of self-reflection, or humility, or sakes-forbid a means for entrenched differences to lessen.