The Complicated Psychology of the Most OFFENSIVE Character on TV 

*SPOILERS* I meant to make this clearer in the video, but I don’t believe that Garrison ACTUALLY has DID, I meant to say that it seemed to be more of a symptom of the BPD rather than an actual separate disorder. Just wanted to clarify that!

My view of Mr. Garisson was summed up perfectly in one line by Chef: "Children, there's a big difference between a gay man, and Mr. Garisson."

Him being upset his father never molested him is criminally underrated

I actually had a history teacher who’s ACTUAL name was Herbert Garrison. He looked exactly like him and was actually a pretty chill guy

Therapist here. I don’t think DID makes sense but BPD in itself involves instability in identity. I think just that diagnosis would fit. This was fun!

Mr. Garrison has always been my favorite character. He steals every scene he is in, and he feels more genuine than other South Park characters (while still being obscure).

Mr Hat is a SCP object that preys on people pretending to be something they're not Mr Garrison for pretending to be gay and Satan for pretending to be super evil. That's my theory lol.

Garrison is Randy from an alternate timeline where he never gets married and thus has nothing to lose, giving in 150% into every strange addiction and fetish his brain can come up with... not just watching them online!

I love how in the movie garrisons response to cartman is “WHAT DID YOU SAY?!” And now its “eric did you just take a crap on my desk?” In the most calm way possible

I'm actually diagnosed with BPD and I did roll my eyes when you first mentioned it but then I continued to watch the video and I just want to say thank you for handling the subject so respectfully. This disorder is absolute hell to live with and there's a lot of stigma attached to it but you explained it beautifully as it applies to Mr. Garrison and I can definitely see him having BPD.

As someone with BPD, I must say that this explained BPD as a disorder far better than most people could. I don't find the assertion of Mr. Garrison having BPD to be even remotely offensive, and I'm glad that you're spreading information about a very stigmatized disorder.

The best Mr. Garrison line ever is "SCISSOR ME TIMBERS!" during that lesbian sex scene 🤣

“He killed someone’s parents and fed them to him” Bloom: Yeah that’s nice and all… 😂

"I find safety boring" I feel like that's how most of us were born.

Mr. Garrison being this extreme abnormality for straight, gay, trans, and religious/atheist characteristics works great, cause that is the world that Matt & Trey have made. South Park as a whole is "What if we took X thing, and made it into the most insane thing to the max?", and Garrison represents this in all of his/her glory throughout

As a man with diagnosed BPD, it's a pretty sad rollercoaster for you partner. I can be extremely pampering to my fiance, then raging mad 10 minutes later. Although, she's actually she is the literal core of my identity and world, and losing her would shatter me. I still am that way sometimes and I feel really bad about it, and my fiance has no reason to stay with me (i wouldn't). I'm not near as bad as i use to be, and the swings and intensity has attenuated quiet a bit. But i REALLY wish i could end it. She pretty normal so i know what normal emotional regulation looks like, but it's hard to mimick sometimes.

As a person with BPD I usually approach videos discussing it with caution, as they usually misrepresent something or contribute to some kind of stigma, but I think you did a great job with this one. As you were going through the symptoms, I was able to identify similar experiences and feelings with my own disorder that paralleled the examples. NEVER thought I'd find myself relating to Mr. Garrison of all characters, nicely done.

"I'm sorry Wendy, but I don't trust anything that bleeds for five days and doesn't die"

hi im diagnosed with bpd and have done so much extensive research on it, before I never really thought deeper into Mr Garrisons personality and behavior but after finishing this video I have to say you did an amazing analysis of his character and I completely agree that he has bpd lmfaoo. now that you have pointed out the symptoms and connected them It makes so much sense for his character to have this disorder and how bpd has an influence on his opinions/actions i.e his extreme black and white thinking, constant changes in his identity, his emotions consistently fluctuating from high to low etc etc. this is such an interesting and honestly one of the coolest videos of yours I've ever watched keep it up man you're doing great 👍❤

still feel bad for the guy that got their head stolen by blooms, he was so successful as a psychologist.

11:40 This sounds a lot like Moral from Moral Oral's dad that had believed that his father beating him meant his father loved him because he was worth beating. For that reason, he beat Moral any chance he got to show he loved Moral or at least respected Moral enough to show he was worth beating. This hits a lot harder when you realize he never lays a finger on Moral's brother who he openly says he doesn't believe is actually his son.

As someone with BPD, when i heard it mentioned I was expecting the typical stigmatised version of it, (Toxic, narcissistic and horrible behaviour) but you actually described it really well! Thank you for not contributing to the stigmatisation of this very misunderstood disorder.

I feel like D.I.D was a really big stretch and stuff like talking puppets is just a thing in sp, just like mitch connor. I wouldn't call cartman someone with D.I.D

Mr. Garrison having BPD makes so much damn sense. His black and white thinking, constant shifts of emotions, and ever-changing identity is very telling. In fact I was thinking about BPD as a possibility when I started watching your video.

He's one of the best mocking characters ever created. Everything he takes seriously is self serving non sense packaged as some form of ethic or morality.

I just realised. In Chef Aid, when 'Mr. Hat' keeps trying to 'kill' Mr. Twig, Cartman does the exact same thing in 1% when he 'kills' his stuffed animals.

I actually think that Mr. Garrison is even worse than Eric Cartman because of his actions in the Pandemic Special. Cartman never did anything as harmful as deliberately keeping an entire pandemic by killing off the only cure. Even he was able to be persuaded not to do that.

I really enjoy this kind of content. I have my abnormal psych students do case studies on fictional characters. I wish they had this much detail. While there are things I don't 100% agree with, the bigger point is this stuff is great and enjoyable. Keep it up!

I was just watching your every South Park character ranked video and the line "I'll most likely release a video on Mr. Garrisons' psychology" just popped into my mind. Also good work man/flower.

Great video blooms, might be my favorite upload so far !! I want to say you did a really good job addressing Bipolar vs BPD because people with these in real life are so often misdiagnosed and it caused them a lot of pain. Like even just thinking about how often when we were kids you’d hear people call people bipolar because their mood changed. That is so damaging one, two it’s also not accurate. Manic and depressive episodes last weeks or even months. Volatile mood switches are associated with BPD. There is so much stigma even in the medical community surrounding BPD so it’s refreshing seeing a more accurate understanding of what it is. The National Alliance on Mental Illness even said that one study found that 40% of people with BPD who met criteria for BPD but not for bipolar disorder were nevertheless misdiagnosed with Bipolar Type 2. I think there’s a lot of stigmatization in our society surrounding mental health, and even though this video is just for fun about a cartoon, I do think you did a good job on it and probably spread some awareness about these disorders.

And THIS is why Mr. Garrison is the most interesting character on South Park. Maybe not the best, but certainly the most interesting. Observing the evolution of his identity and affiliations throughout the show make his arc unlike that of any other character.

Now i want the psychology of pip the most interesting, funny, unforgettable and overall best character on South Park.

When he came back in Vaccination Special, I was so happy. And I am so glad you did a video on him

please stop confusing homosexuality with child predatory behaviour lmao, as Chef said "There's a big difference between a homosexual and mister garrison"

Oh man I was just starting my research process for “The Evolution of Garrison” - wild timing! This will pop off

I was nervous to watch this at first as a person with BPD, psychotic depression, and DID because most of these kinds of videos rely on harmful stereotypes and shit like that but I was pleasantly surprised. thank you for keeping people like us in mind

Mr. Twig is also a very very well hidden joke about the origin of the f slur.

This should definitely become a series on this channel.

The "psychiatrist" in that episode is a riff off a show that aired at the time called Dr. Katz Profesional Therapist. The show was basically a vehicle for stand-up comedians, in animation form, to come do part of thejr stand-up routines. I used to LOVE that show.

Mr. Garrison is a mouthpiece character. Tray, Matt & the other writers use him/her lots to discuss the topic of an episode.

I have BPD, along with being gay and trans, and the moment I heard you mention BPD I immediately got worried, and was also worried about how you’d talk about queer people, but I was actually really happy with how you discussed these topics, you discussed them in a very appropriate, accurate way! I appreciate that a lot

He definitely does not have D.I.D. from my understanding, you can't project your alters onto anything outside of yourself, you physically go through switching between different alters. You can just have one alter but they aren't going to be something that exist as a consistent presence like that. Bpd is more accurate and he could also be bipolar, you can have both. People have multiple personality traits. But take that with his repressed sexuality, Mr hand was the best way for him to cope. To isolate the parts of him he doesn't like into something outside of him. Also those with D.I.D, will try to avoid anything that could trigger their trauma, meanwhile Mr hand is just all trauma. Though with Mr garrison, he changes his beliefs to the extreme, from my understanding, to feel accepted. He recognizes that if he agrees with that belief, then that person will give him love and adoration. Which is why he takes it to such extremes, I don't really believes he truly believes all the shit he says.

i believe he has closer to schizo-affective disorder regarding mister hat, as alters from a did system cannot communicate with each other outside of the “headspace”, (aside from maybe notes the fronting alter could leave in the physical world) if at all, because systems not actively trying to fuse their alters through extensive healing and therapy are usually unaware they are systems, or they are aware, but it is incredibly hard for their alters to communicate. That’s because the fragmented personalities and memories, are completely detached from each other, as the entire point of the disorder is that it is a defense mechanism to extreme childhood trauma (protecting the body by storing the information away - into certain alters who have actually suffered this trauma - with no or minimal access to it so that the other alters/the body does not need to go through the trauma again and process it). Therefore there is no way for them to communicate in the physical world, as they are either different people in a single body, and there cannot be two full fledged, fully fronting people at once, or co conscious, in which case theyd be talking to eachother internally since theyd be sharing thoughts to a certain extent. And besides, switching as rapid as he would need to experience to be able to talk to mister hat like that is incredibly uncommon. My evidence for schizo aff disorder is the fact he experiences strong delusions (1 that the puppet is alive, 2 that the puppet speaks through him, 3 stereotypical delusions of violent intent or a higher purpose, such as hallucinating the puppet telling him to kill someone, hallucinating the puppet moving, speaking, and experiencing dellusions of paranoia). furthermore he seems to be going through psychotic episodes rather than constantly being in this state, one episode being the puppet, another one about being transgender (not saying transgender people are delusional, obviously. i mean that in his case it could have very well been another delusion where he believed he was trans because of some higher reason caused by his hallucinations), and then the donald trump one. the more i think about it the more i feel like schizo affective disorder is very fitting for him, but if anybody has any contra points im open to hearing them(: i hope this made sense

Am i the only one who finds it impressive how complex South Park's characters are?

There is of course also the QUIET version of this disorder, wherein most of the symptoms that are often acted upon and become external behaviours are instead internalized, sometimes to the point of a close-to or actual psychotic break from reality. Imagine having all this atuff constantly raging inside you without being able to ventilate or perhaps even open up about it... Seems like the definition for living in "hell on earth".

The psychiatrist is Dr Katz, who later played Paula's dad on Home Movies. Both shows had the same squiggly animation.

Thank you for making these videos. Really coming into my life at a rather important time. Doing my best out of high school to continue to educate myself and I hear a lot from my girlfriend and her best friend but these videos really help me connect the dots on how they get to their conclusions. Thanks Blooms.

You totally missed the opportunity to mention that Garrison's mom felt the exact same way about what his childhood should have actually been like according to him.

Him having BPD actually accounts for what you perceived as DID symptoms. But the main symptom present in DID that you missed is dissociation. The individual personalities are rarely co-conscious without a good amount of therapy. Because your brain tries to hide that there are other individuals there. You experience large amounts of time being unaccounted for because another individual is fronting. Dissociation is a vital part of that diagnosis that Mr. Garrison NEVER exhibited. But some people with BPD appear to have DID because of the severe instability of their identity and aspects of their personality (not to say you can’t experience both disorders). It just doesn’t make sense to say he had DID.

26:49 Chronic feelings of emptiness Imo this trait is extremely common to find in the Seasons of him running for aswell as being president of the US, besides all the events you mentioned, he just ran for president because he got people accepting and following him and his ideals so he again had to do the extreme and fill his inner void with this and ONLY this thing until realizing (again) when he reached his goal of becoming that only thing that the inner emptiness is still there and on top that the thing he became isnt fitting the person he truly is. Great Video and great Analysis, I am not a psychologist or anything but Ive seen South Park (+Content relating to it like Games or Videos like this one) 20K+ hours of my life by now and I am a enthusiastic analyzer myself Btw I just told my girlfriend the whole mr garrison story a few months ago and watching the video kinda felt like a more detailed version of just what I was talking about, so this video hit an extra sweet spot of mine Keep up the great content, and btw if you are interested in future Video Ideas or help with the research hmu, I dreamed of creating content just like this for so long but I dont got the skill and time for it tbh

I just found this channel yesterday and been binge watching a bunch of episodes since then. Your scripts are so good, and the presentation of your videos are also really good.

I love this video, if there are any more characters applicable to this format, I'd love to see videos about them too

I have bpd and knew that's what you'd assign to garrison straight away 😅😅 I personally had a gender crisis as part of my bpd but never transitioned like garrison thankfully It's a fuckin wild ride of a disorder to say the least

just wanted to thank you for getting me into south park. i struggle with severe depression and bpd and this show really made me laugh these last few days and your videos are so interesting they're a joy to watch as well. thank you for that and i hope u get more subs, your content is top notch

Blooms: Mr/Mrs Garrison exhibits signs of DID, but are more accurate diagnosis would be BPD. Matt & Trey: Yeah, so we had this teacher that talked funny...

As a trans person I feel like the Mrs. Garrison being homophobic was a lot like watching Caitlyn Jenner transition but be against gay marriage. As problematic as I found the depictions of trans people, it ended up being an interesting commentary on a real trans person later on

The first SP episode I ever watched was of Garrison's S9 gender change. That was certainly a shocking first impression

i was just watching your character ranking video last night where you said you were thinking of making this video haha and woke up today to this

I mean its well known that Mr. Hat IS alive. He blinks and moves on his own in numerous episodes

I got diagnosed with BPD like two months ago and I’m still learning about how it affects my behaviors. But I did NOT think to be taught about it here 😭

He’s always a funny character to me because the teacher he’s based on subbed at my school in CO. Character was dead on.

As a psychologist myself, I am really impressed by ur analysis. Very rational and thoughtful plus carefully researched. You put in a lot of effort. Props to you man! One thing to add: DID is not a good fit. I get your point tho, but DiD has amnesia and typically their Identities dont know each other. But its a cartoon ffs. Actually his behaviour with mr hat cpuld be more of a psychotic episode

I like how garrison parodied the worst type of people befor they found twitter

bro had 2 homophobia arcs and he gets a whole video essay but when i do it im a piece of shit smh

One of the most disturbing things about him is that he met up with Cartman after talking online. We know where this goes… it’s highly likely he has done this before and not been caught. But it’s still funny when he says “this little boy was trying to have his way with me”.

As somebody who is diagnosed with BPD, I let out a sigh when you mentioned it cause my first thought was "here we go, bring on the stigma that everybody with borderline is a horrible person", only to be pleasantly surprised at how respectful you actually handled the topic. I'm glad I stayed to watch.

This is my first video of yours, the quality and entertainment value is amazing, you have definitely earned a new subscriber

I’m new to your channel and binged all your South Park content in the past two weeks! It’s really great stuff, wishing you success🎉‼️

I have bpd and splitting is what got me out of many relationships, one day I would love, care and think they were the best thing in the world, the other they are the worst

Super excited to see you make more content for the next season of South Park next month!

I don't think Mr. Garrison has DID since it's just him and Mr. Hat, but the Chinese takeout guy does have DID

My boys mom has BPD. She has put me through so much. But I still miss her and love her. It’s sad to me that we can’t be a family. But to me it seems like she lets her issues get in the way of being a family. Even when she says that’s what she really wants. It’s tough. I just try to support her in ways I can but I also kinda become cannon fodder in the process. Wasn’t expecting this video to make me kinda sad. Lol

16:30 Hey just wanted to say as a trans woman referring to him as "Mr. Garrison" when talking about his time as a trans woman is actually the correct thing to do. When talking about the past of someone who has transitioned (or in Mr. Garrisons case detransitioned) it's considered proper etiquette to use their current name and pronouns and not what they went by in the past, and seeing as Mr. Garrison is (currently) a man, calling him "Mr. Garrison" while talking about his time spent as a trans woman is correct (though yeah admittedly this is a really uncommon situation especially seeing as the part of his past you're speaking about is the part where he temporarily transitions)

After a severe burnout I got misdiagnosed with borderline personality disorder and narcissism, by some rather ignorant psychiatrist, who even tried to sabotage my autism diagnosis I later got by a neuropsychologist, which then explained, why someone only looking at the surface and not seeing through my masking, why someone could get to the former conclusions. I've done my own research and talked to other medical professionals to start completely ruling out the BPD and NPD claims and this video again was able to reinforce what I found out. Reading about personality disorders in studies and medical literature is one thing, but sometimes seeing a fictional character deliberately or coincidentally having those traits, was able to show me what I'm definitely not. And I'm purely talking about the diagnostic criteria.

mrs garrison was so funny i wish we got more of her 😭

The therapist from Summer Sucks is actually Dr.Katz from another Comedy Central show called Dr.Katz. Its one of South Parks only crossovers

As someone with diagnosed BPD, I always loved Mr. Garrison as I felt I could relate to some of his extremes (plus he has some of the funniest lines in the show IMO)

So, Mr Garrison is possibly going through ongoing abuse by a family member (the uncle who molested him "last Saturday") and now he's upset that his dad wouldn't do the same thing bc he's convinced that's what love is. That's so insanely dark but the way it's presented is so morbidly funny 💀

Thank you for your sensitivity, respectful approach & well informed + accurately articulate handling of discussing BPD(Borderline Personality Disorder)!!! While watching your video, early into it when you were aligning your analysis with Bi-Polar Disorder; I didn't agree, but I thought that you might not have been aware of Borderline Personality Disorder as a diagnosis or at least the understandably difficult distinctive difference between them since they are arguably very similar. As I kept watching, I was elated to hear you correct your diagnosis to Borderline Personality Disorder. I'd nod in agreement & amusedly think to myself "Yup, been there. Done that." "Yeah, that's how it is." "Mhmm, guilty of that, too."

Anyone else old enough to remember the Doctor Katz reference as Garrison's therapist? Wow I forgot all about that older cartoon 😂

Love your channel! Keep it up!

Great video I’m very happy you uploaded this ❤

Yess I love your videos man!! Can’t wait to watch this

Wonderful deep dive into a crazy character, keep up the great work🤲🏾🔥🫡

YES! Thank god, I was waiting for the Mr. Garrison episode for so long. This was real well made, thanks Blooms!

Fantastic episode. Glad you're back.

wow ive been obsessed with your content lately and just realized that i wasnt subscribed, had to hit that button

This ain't Mr Garrison,this is Chris Chan's story

i think not using garrison's feminine pronouns is a fair read. it's incredibly obvious that he isn't genuine in feminine presentation. as a transfem myself i don't really like the idea of gatekeeping pronoun use, but you still maintained a respectful tone. it was easy to tell it wasn't from a place of spite, and i really appreciate the care you took! great vid ☺️

I think its funny how Garrison unironically perfectly fits the radical parts of both sides of the aisle

There was an episode of 'This Is England' where a guy was r-ing one of his daughter and was cruel with her, he even r-ed one of their friends once. The sister he didn't abuse was in tears because he didn't do it to her, she thought he didn't love her as much and she wasn't special. It was so crazy, the abused sister couldn't calm her down to get through to her.

That situation with his dad was one of the funniest in the show

I'm the topic of you referring to Garrison as Mr Garrison, he transitioned back and currently identifies as a male, so weirdly enough the easy thing to do was also the right thing to do! Not that anyone would have blamed you if you chose to call him Mrs Garrison during that time period, it's a character study of a cartoon character

welcome back hope you are feeling better👀

The psychiatrist in that episode was the titular cartoon character from the show “Dr Katz, professional therapist”

i can't tell if the most offensive character in south park is cartman or if its garrison

Well played video cant wait for the next one

YESSS!!!! i’m so happy you made this.

I love that i commented on the cartman video about the different psychology of other characters and now has actually doing it Great work man keep up the hard work

As someone who has been diagnosed with bpd but after a year of DBT, a divorce, and a lot of healthy self reflection and research I can say I actually believe I am on the autistic spectrum and also have complex ptsd. This final diagnosis of Mr Garrison sounds like it makes the most sense