science

Mr. Mackey

Mr. Mackey is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Mr. Mackey rather than just read about it. In short: Mr. Mackey Jr. is a fictional character in the adult animated television series South Park.

Key takeaways

Mr. Mackey belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Mr. Mackey to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Mr. Mackey from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Mr. Mackey Jr. is a fictional character in the adult animated television series South Park. He is voiced by series co-creator Trey Parker and debuted in the season one episode "Mr. Hankey, the Christmas Poo". The school counselor at South Park Elementary, he is best known for saying "m'kay" at the end (or beginning) of most of his sentences. Mr. Mackey is based on Parker's junior high school counselor Stan Lackey.

Appearance Mackey has a disproportionately large head, which is caused by the tightness of his tie. He wears a green long-sleeved shirt, a blue tie, dark blue pants, and blue leather shoes, as well as black-rimmed glasses. He speaks with a Southern accent. Mackey has black yet thinning hair.

Character biography Mackey is the school counselor at South Park Elementary, and occasionally teaches classes at the school. Judging from the episode "Insheeption", Mackey was most likely born in 1965, making him a member of Generation X. This is supported by the many 1980's references that are made involving Mackey during the episode "Back to the Cold War", such as Mackey's childhood bedroom, the WarGames parody, as well as Mackey dancing to Wang Chung's "Dance Hall Days" during a duck and cover drill at the elementary school. This is also supported by the episode "Taming Strange", in which popular 1980s music plays from Mackey's computer on the school intercom while trying to use the new Intellilink system, such as Lionel Richie's "All Night Long (All Night)" and Glenn Frey's "The Heat Is On" from the Beverly Hills Cop soundtrack. Mackey taught sex education with Ms. Choksondik, with whom he had a sexual relationship until her death. Following this, he took over the fourth-grade class until Mr. Garrison returned. In "Ike's Wee Wee", Mackey taught Mr. Garrison's class about drugs, smoking, and alcohol. He was fired after marijuana he passed out to the students was stolen by Mr. Garrison. He was consequently evicted by his landlord, which caused him to fall into depression and take drugs himself. Mackey holds generally left-wing political views, as he protested against the Iraq War in the season seven episode "I'm a Little Bit Country". However, in the season twelve episode About Last Night, he was shown as a supporter of John McCain's presidential campaign in 2008 and was shown upset that he lost. He also signed up to I.C.E. in "Got a Nut", It was presumed that in "Proper Condom Use", the last time Mackey had sex was 21 years ago (when he mentions he was 19). In the episodes "Something You Can Do with Your Finger" and "Cat Orgy" it was hinted there were bondage sex scenes with Liane Cartman, where in the former episode, Eric Cartman watches a tape of Mackey and Liane, where the latter is Mackey's sex slave, and drinks from a cup of her own urine, while the latter episode shows Mackey flirting with Liane. In "Insheeption" it was revealed that Mackey is a hoarder because of his troubled childhood when he was a fourth-grader in 1974. He was shown to be bullied by other children and was a fan of Woodsy Owl, but at the end of a field trip, the owl molested him. Later in the episode, he threatened to rape Stan Marsh in the mouth if the latter threw any of the clutter in Mackey's office away. Mackey was shown in "Trapped in the Closet" as a member of the Church of Scientology, though no later episodes mention this. He is fluent in Spanish, as shown in "Rainforest Shmainforest". Unlike many of the major adult characters, his first name is currently unknown.

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Mr. Mackey

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Mr. Mackey claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Mr. Mackey before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Mr. Mackey ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Mr. Mackey

In research: Mr. Mackey appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Mr. Mackey in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Mr. Mackey is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Animated characters introduced in 1997, Fictional Republicans (United States), Fictional characters from Colorado, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Mr. Mackey outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Mr. Mackey in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Mr. Mackey means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Mr. Mackey out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Mr. Mackey in simple terms?

Mr. Mackey Jr. is a fictional character in the adult animated television series South Park.

Why does Mr. Mackey matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Mr. Mackey?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Mr. Mackey.