Patrick Star's Job

                                                           Patrick Star's Job


     Patrick Star, the beloved but idiotic pink starfish from the hit TV show, SpongeBob SquarePants, represents the proletariat people, or working class, pretty accurately in the times of Karl Marx. For this, I will be examining the episode, "The Fry Cook Games" to show how Patrick, despite his stupidity, actually lands a job pretty easily.

     To begin with, the episode starts out with SpongeBob ready to compete in the annual Fry Cook Games which should really just be called "a chance for people with jobs to rub it in to the unemployed." SpongeBob is later visited by his friend Patrick who, despite his laziness, is excited when he hears the word, "games," and asks to join in the fun. SpongeBob, supposedly representing the bourgeoisie, patronizingly tells him that he has to be a fry cook to join. Patrick doesn't believe that it can be that hard to become one only to be dismissed by SpongeBob, saying fry cooks are "an elite core." Uh, SpongeBob, you're a fry cook, not a CEO.

     Later on, it's revealed that Patrick is able to get a job at the Chum Bucket. I'm kind of surprised that Patrick wasn't rejected for being over-qualified. Let's run down his list of skills: drooling, eating, sleeping, doing absolutely nothing, and sticking to the bottom of his rock. The reason why this situation suits a Marxist style of life is that people like SpongeBob, who represents the bourgeoisie, obviously have the skills and the passion to go about this job. People like Patrick, who represents the proletarian class, don't possess such skills, but he was able to get the job anyhow due to him wanting a job.

     Patrick's skills play no role in him getting the job, but rather by him simply going in and receiving one. It fits in well with Marxism because in a Marxist society, nobody in any situation, including people in a higher class than others, are not allowed to outshine those that might be considered inferior in a capitalist society. In a communist society, as portrayed by Karl Marx in his 1848 book "The Communist Manifesto," he stressed the importance of equal ground for all in terms of pay, work experience, and shared interests. It can be safe to assume that in this episode Patrick does have the same interest as SpongeBob in the sense that he wants to become a fry cook, and it can also be implied that he's getting the same pay as SpongeBob as well as having the same job position as his best friend. It is also because of Patrick having a job as a Chum Bucket fry cook that he is able to participate in the fry cook games. The fry cook games seem to represent a secret society that is only accessible to those that match its criteria; SpongeBob and later Patrick thanks to Marxism are able to be a part of this society.

     There are plenty of other examples I could've gone into in regards to Marxism in SpongeBob, but I look at this as a good example of how SpongeBob is not the only top dog when it comes to fry cooking or having an invitation to the games.