Fair enough. I suppose, if I were to try to get you to hold them in high regard, I would appeal to your value on freedom of expression and speech. South Park more than anyone on television has been a champion of those values and been willing to put their heads on the line for it. Sorta similar to that french cartoon that caused the french terror attack (cannot remember the name)...I don't think you have to like them or find them in good taste, but I do think they deserve to be lauded for taking a stand on freedom of expression and pushing the envelope. So that shows of today could play in a much larger space.
It also could just be my love of renegades and punks hitting it big, but a lot about South Park in the early days feels like it never should have gotten the greenlight from anyone. I mean, it's iconic at this point, but it looked like ****, it wasn't friendly for the whole family, and the guys making it weren't hollywood money. I have the same feelings for a lot of the edgier artists out there, by all stretches of the imagination, their rise was even more miraculous than the usual rise. It's sorta like my own generation's equivalent of the Sex Pistols or Ramones.
I also don't necessarily agree with your characterization of them as attempting to appeal to teenage edgelords. In fact, I almost take that as a misreading because of their fanbase at this point and the show genre they helped spawn. It's just too smart too often for it being only teenage edgelord aimed. Why bother having strong writing like they do when you could just be very cruel and mean. <---that's Family Guy's forumla essentially.
A lot of people forget that before South Park, taking shots at religion as openly as they do was a huge no fly zone. Particularly in the cases of Scientology and Mormonism because if you think Christians don't have a sense of humor, you haven't seen the legal teams and smear campaigns they'll run.
