Bill Maher has made his mark as the comedian who refuses to toe the party line—any party’s line. He has come under attack by both the right and the left for his positions. This week’s show exemplifies his unflinching desire to muddy the waters of extremist thinking and get viewers to ask tough questions and refuse pre-packaged scripts.
He hit the spotlight after September 11 when he rejected the idea that the 9/11 attackers were cowards. Talking with conservative pundit Dinesh D’Souza, Maher stated: “We have been the cowards. Lobbing cruise missiles from 2,000 miles away. That’s cowardly. Staying in the airplane when it hits the building. Say what you want about it. Not cowardly.” The comment cost him his ABC show. But he soon landed back on his feet with HBO for “Real time with Bill Maher.”
picture: low back wedding dressesThis week’s show, which tackled both the Paris attacks and campus protests over racial discrimination, reminds us why Maher is a comedian we need to watch. In the wake of the crises on the campuses of University of Missouri and Yale and on the heels of the Paris attacks, Maher rejected the fundamentalist thinking that often tends to frame these issues. With regard to the student protests, he attacks racism, but defends free speech. And in connection to the Paris attacks, he asks why liberals refuse to condemn the oppressive fundamentalism connected to the version of Islam practiced by terrorists.
While we might disagree with his positions, Maher makes some provocative points. Even more important he asks viewers to resist intellectual extremism and dogmatic ideologies. This means that we can condemn Islamic extremism without condemning all Islamic people. And it means that we can fight structural racism while also wondering if the student protesters’ demands are reasonable.
Let’s be clear. Bill Maher can say some outrageous things. He once compared his dogs to “retarded children.” But it would be a mistake to dismiss his interventions because they come from a comedian known for being caustic and controversial. Again and again Maher is willing to ask the questions no one wants to ask. And one of his key themes is frustration over simple-minded responses to complex issues.
After opening with a sign of solidarity with the French people, he asked: How can we respond in a way that allows us to forcefully condemn the attackers while avoiding a full-scale condemnation of Islam? In an interview with Asra Nomani, Maher wonders why liberals “will not stand up against Sharia Law, which is the law in so many Muslim countries, which is the law of oppression?” Discussing extremist thinking with Nomani, he states, “I am absolutely sure that ISIS thinks that everything they do—every horrific crime, every atrocity—is an act of justice, and an act for god.”
Maher’s point it that there is an Islamic extremism that is real and the left has lost the vocabulary for speaking about it meaningfully. In an effort to avoid demonizing an entire religion, he argues, there has been silence on the very real threats of Islamic extremism. It is an issue that drives Maher nuts and it’s one that will immediately get him called out as an Islamaphobe.
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