There's no nuance or complexity in inviting a notorious transphobe on your show and not engaging in pushback and agreeing with them on their transphobia.
There's no nuance or complexity in inviting a notorious transphobe on your show and not engaging in pushback and agreeing with them on their transphobia.
While I guess I can see not refusing to take part in discussion with folks you are not on the same page with politically, look at the people you mentioned.
They are not folks with a different political point of view.
They are tune up artists.
It's hard to make excuses for that stuff based on including different points of view.
Bill Maher also wants his show to be entertaining. He's not going to have on someone he disagrees with if their argument is boring. He also won't have on someone he agrees with, whom he finds boring. Whatever else you may say about Milo Y. (I won't even attempt to spell his last name) or Ann Coulter, they do raise the heat in the room, and like it or not, that can be entertaining.
One guy's take...
The jury is out on "Entertaining..."(and it doesn't look good for said assertion).
They are each about like folks you see calling Coulter a "Horse Face" or taking shots at HRC because she wears pant suits regularly.
That garbage most likely is not "Entertaining..." Never mind having any relevant place in a political discussion.
I never said that he needs those people to be entertaining. But if you have the de facto censorship of everyone telling people like Milo Y. or Ann Coulter that they won't be allowed to have a forum, how long before far left provocateurs are treated the same way? I know that slippery slope arguments often have no grounding, but I know I wouldn't want to live in a country where the threat of boycotts and the like gradually narrows the spectrum of opinion until all we're left with is the most mealy-mouthed of CNN commentators.
I don't know. Maybe when a specific member of the far left espouses violent racism and transphobia and singles out individual transwomen get them harassed and threatened and gets invited on a tv show?
Fortunately, we are a long way from those concerns becoming reality when guys like Milo were still getting prime TV bookings in light of having actually done those things. As the article I cited pointed out: Maher had nothing to do with his downfall and spoke approvingly of him and then tried to take credit after the fact for his downfall.
Dude is scum. There's nothing wrong with having an entertaining show of varied viewpoints and ideas and discussion. Maher isn't it.
Last edited by Tendrin; 11-02-2019 at 06:57 PM.
If the guy's show ever once came down to anything of legitimate political insight, it might be worth it.
Think back to when Ann Coulter said Trump would wind up President, and Joy Reid was on the panel.
Was there any serious discussion of if it could happen directed at Reid, or was it "Let's make fun of this goofy blonde?"
If this show just wants to be "Jerry Springer", so be it. That said, it ought to be treated like it is that sort of show.