‘Family Guy’ star Patrick Warburton says he’s done apologizing for show’s controversial humor

Patrick Warburton has had enough of apologizing for Family Guy.

The 59-year-old American actor is known for many roles throughout his career, starring in shows like Seinfeld, Ellen, and Rules of Engagement. But none of those shows come close to the actor’s longevity in the animated US sitcom, Family Guy.

Created by Seth MacFarlane all the way back in 1998, the show first hit our screens the following year, and has gone on to become one of the most popular sitcoms – animated or not – of all time.

Spanning 22 seasons and over 400 episodes, Family Guy is known for its near-the-knuckle humor, with MacFarlane once saying: “Family Guy likes to hold a mirror up to society and say, ‘Society, you’re ugly.'”

One of the show’s longest-running characters is Warburton’s character, Joe Swanson, a paraplegic police officer known for his strength and short temper.

Patrick Warburton voices Joe in the hit animated sitcom. Credit: FOX/Getty

After appearing in over 270 episodes of the show, some of Joe’s most popular storylines include the episode where teen neighbor Meg Griffin falls madly in love with him and the one where Joe abandons his friends and family after getting a leg transplant.

Now, despite many people obviously finding Family Guy hilarious, there are many who believe the show goes “too far” with its attempts at comedy. (Not me, I’m a big fan, personally.) In fact, even Warburton’s own mother, Parents Television Council member Barbara Warburton, has criticized the show for “sending the wrong messages to children”, per the Daily Mail.

But her son believes he has nothing to apologize for, as he told Fox News: “I used to apologize for being on Family Guy, and I apologize no more because this world is a horrible native satire.”

“Everybody takes themselves too seriously, and… I think in many ways become an overwhelming mess,” Warburton added. “But we need humor in our lives, and we need love and humor, acceptance. It’s all rather simple.”

Patrick Warburton has had enough of apologizing for Family Guy. Credit: Michael S. Schwartz / Getty

During the interview, Warburton also spoke about his religious upbringing, and how his mother had raised him. “I was brought up very Catholic. My father was in the monastery for three months,” he said, adding: “That being said, my mother was worse than my father.

“I mean, she has scrupulosity, so it’s all religion all the time with my mother. Cut to, like, two years ago, when my wife’s doing Ancestry.com, she finds out that I’m actually 12.4% Ashkenazi Jew.”

The Daily Mail reports that Mrs. Warburton had admitted to praying to God that her son would quit his role on Family Guy.

Despite MacFarlane and the show often towing the line of what is acceptable in comedy, the show’s creator has revealed the joke that he believes went too far.

Seth MacFarlane created the show. Credit: Frazer Harrison / Getty

During an interview for USA’s show Out of Character with Krista Smith, MacFarlane – who voices many of the show’s characters himself – revealed which season one joke he says he’d “rather we not have done”.

Per Joe.ie, MacFarlane said: “The JFK Pez Dispenser was something I would probably not do now.”

Just in case you need your minds refreshing, that particular joke appeared in the episode ‘A Hero Sits Next Door’ and shows a John F. Kennedy Pez Dispenser being targeted by a police sniper. (Which… yeah, we can see why some people would not want to see that on their screens.)

And speaking of refusing to apologize for things, another comedy that has long been criticized is the 2008 movie, Tropic Thunder – mainly over its use of blackface for Robert Downey Jr.’s character, Kirk Lazarus.

The satirical action comedy film – which was directed by Ben Stiller – tells the story of a group of actors who were shooting a big-budget war movie and were forced to become the soldiers they were portraying.

The Oppenheimer star opened up about the criticism again during his recent appearance on Rob Lowe’s Literally! podcast, and made comparisons to Norman Lear’s sitcom All in the Family, which also focused on racism themes.

“I was looking back at ‘All in the Family,’ and they had a little disclaimer that they were running at the beginning of the show,” he said, per Movie Web. “People should look it up, exactly what it is, because it is an antidote to this clickbait addiction to grievance that [people seem] to have with everything these days.”

Downey Jr was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for his role in Tropic Thunder. Credit: Kevin Winter / Getty

“The language was saying, ‘Hey, this is the reason that we’re doing these things that, in a vacuum, you could pick apart and say are wrong and bad,'” the Iron Man star continued, adding that there “used to be an understanding with an audience” but now “things have gotten very muddied”.