Have you been watching Guido Zoo, MTV's controlled anthropological study of the eating, drinking, and mating habits of the young East Coast Reticulated Dillweed?
If you have, then you've been treated to such spectacles as Angelina packing her garbage bags and leaving the shore house, the slow deterioration of the nest of decrepit rags that is sewn to the top of JWOWW's unfortunate head, a (probably) 43-year-old man referring to himself as "The Situation," and, of course, Snooki, aka Snickers, aka Snacki getting punched in the face by someone at a bar or something.
That last spectacle was of such important cultural value that MTV put it in the trailer for The Jersey Shore—a trailer which they then aired on their network 15,000 times (estimated) and dissiminated online in the hope of shocking everyone into being interested in their little cultural study. It worked. Everyone was outraged that MTV would show such a thing, and MTV took all that fluffy outrage, shoved it into a pillowcase, and took a nap, secure in the knowledge that no one would ever stop talking about The Jersey Shore. Also, they offered to run a PSA about violence after the episode, cause MTV is all about being aware of awareness.
Over the weekend, however, MTV decided they're not gonna show the punch at all because, you know, whatever, everyone's already seen it anyway, and by refusing to show the punch in the show they can pretend to care about stopping violence while still shoving violence in everyone's sensory receptors. Or, as they put it:
"What happened to "Snooki" was a crime and obviously extremely disturbing," MTV said in a statement Friday. "After hearing from our viewers, further consulting with experts on the issue of violence, and seeing how the video footage has been taken out of context to not show the severity of this act or the resulting consequences, MTV has decided not to air "Snooki" being physically punched in next week's episode."
Translation: "Hey, y'all. Would everyone mind unseeing Snooki getting knocked off of her bar stool after some asshole stranger punched her, hard, in the face for no apparent reason? Wasn't that crazy? It was sooo crazy—which is why we showed it hundreds of times cause it proves our thesis statement that these are the craziest guidos. But someone told us it was violent and violence is bad? Mmkay, thanks, bye!"
Has MTV ever seen MTV? Because if they're gonna start literally pulling punches and removing anything that could be considered "a crime" and "obviously extremely disturbing" from their programming, they're going to have to dismantle not just The Jersey Shore (which is essentially 7 spray tan bundles shoving each other on a boardwalk while house music plays and someone screams, "Jacuzzi!!"), but the entire Real World franchise as well. They're also going to have to stop sending old Real World and Road Rules cast members to foreign countries so they can drink all day and find out what the local penalties for misdemeanor assault are all night.
That said, it's interesting to note that MTV is only pulling the footage of Snooki getting "physically punched." Apparently, she's in for some kind of mental, emotional, or spiritual punching in this week's episode—mental, emotional, or spiritual punching that goes above and beyond simply being a cast member on Guido Zoo. Maybe the producers force the cast members to do long division or something? Tune in and find out!