NEW YORK, April 23 (UPI) -- A "South Park" episode's portrayal of Prophet Mohammed was altered with bleeps and graphics after a radical Muslim group warned of retribution, producers said.
In the "South Park" show aired this week on Comedy Central, producers Trey Parker and Matt Stone altered images and dialogue about Mohammed with a "censored" graphic and audio bleeps after Revolution Muslim posted a warning of dire consequences on its Web site, The New York Times reported Friday.
Besides those measures, Comedy Central "placed numerous additional audio bleeps throughout the episode," Parker and Stone said Thursday in a post on their company's Web site, SouthParkStudios.com. The message also said the network wasn't allowing the episode to be streamed on the Web site, where "South Park" shows usually appear on their Comedy Central broadcast.
In their statement, Parker and Stone wrote, "In the 14 years we've been doing 'South Park' we have never done a show that we couldn't stand behind. We delivered our version of the show to Comedy Central, and they made a determination to alter the episode."
A spokesman for Comedy Central confirmed to the Times Thursday it bleeped out more audio on the show that regularly jabs sensitive subjects and did not rebroadcast the new episode as it normally does.
The show had depicted the prophet wearing a bear costume.
Revolution Muslim member Younus Abdullah Muhammad restated that the post was not a threat, linking the group's complaints about "South Park" to its grievances about American support for Israel and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Times said.
Asked if the FBI was investigating the matter, Special Agent Richard Kolko in New York told the Times the agency did not "monitor people or groups -- we investigate criminal activity."
