Comparing Dr. Nick Riviera From ‘The Simpsons’ to Dr. Oz Isn’t Fair to Dr. Nick

President-elect Donald Trump continues to announce comically terrible cabinet picks seemingly plucked out of half-remembered TV listings from 2013. Now he’s added Dr. Mehmet Oz to a lineup that already includes Fox News hosts Sean Duffy (formerly of The Real World) and Pete Hegseth, as well as WWE co-founder Linda McMahon. 

Dr. Oz has been tapped to lead the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, a decision that’s led a lot of folks online to make jokes comparing Trump’s pick to another famous TV quack: Dr. Nick Riviera. 

But that’s not exactly a fair comparison — to Dr. Nick, that is.

Sure, Dr. Nick’s not perfect. He lost his watch during an operation, dispenses opioids from a Pez dispenser, once stole cadavers in order to drive in the carpool lane and surgically swapped poor Mr. McGreg’s arm and leg.

But Dr. Nick may just be a better physician than Dr. Oz. For starters, it’s clear that Dr. Nick, despite his shortcomings, is trying his very best. Sure, he makes mistakes along the way, but he does, ultimately, want to help people, not just enrich himself and boost his own fame.

Dr. Nick’s rates are surprisingly reasonable, too, offering Springfieldians an affordable healthcare option. If it wasn’t for his discount medical practice, The Simpsons would have ended midway through Season Four because Homer would have died of massive heart failure.

And even when Dr. Nick spouts pseudo-scientific quackery, he seems to actually believe it.

Dr. Oz, on the other hand, began his career by using allegedly spurious medical techniques as a springboard for his own celebrity. According to Vox, when a young Dr. Oz co-founded the Cardiac Complementary Care Center at Columbia-Presbyterian, he employed alternative methods including hypnosis and prayer. 

Experimenting with alternative medicine is one thing, but medical experts at the time blasted Oz’s Center for “promoting fraudulent alternatives as genuine.” Even Dr. Oz’s own partner, who co-founded the Center, thought that Oz’s marketing became “inappropriate,” and urged him to “stop the media circus.” Former employees said that Oz didn’t actually care about his patients, he was only feigning interest when there were cameras present. Keep in mind, this was before he had a TV show. 

Dr. Nick, though his advice is sometimes terrible/dangerous, seems to genuinely care about and engage with his patients, with no ulterior motive. Even if it means urging them to chew bacon instead of gum.

Not to mention, every time Dr. Nick made spurious medical claims, it wasn’t beamed into the homes of millions of TV viewers all across the world. Plus, as far as we know, Dr. Nick has never been sued, whereas Dr. Oz was once the subject of a class-action suit for misrepresenting the effects of a “miracle” diet supplement (the case was settled for $5.25 million).

The internet owes the most famous graduate of the Hollywood Upstairs Medical College an apology.