The Real Threat: Out of Control Comedians

June 3, 2017

Last night, Bill Maher said the “n-word” during his show – so, the left, the right and Twitter bots of all stripes went crazy. Maher used the word reflexively and actually pronounced the modern softer shorter form for the expletive during an interview with Congressman Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), as in “I’m a house n***a!”. His delivery played to mixed reaction – of course.

I suppose Bill may have been feeling left out, what with Kathy Griffin getting all the politically correct attention lately. Or, maybe, he was coming to her aid by drawing some of the self-righteous fire, maybe. Then again, perhaps he was really stoned and it just slipped out (most likely).

So, let’ see, Trump is selling us to Putin, an 80-year-old KKK fan is AG, Exxon CEO the Secretary of State, our police are acting like gangs with badges and the lead article on Huffington is about Maher’s vernacular and Twitter is trending #billmaher #hurtmyfeelings. Great.

Oh, and we have progressives joining the alt-right in demanding someone (Bill, Kathy) be silenced. Gotta love that “free speech for me, not you” bunch whatever their origin. A few tweeters even proclaimed they would not give Bill a pass, as if “a pass” were something theirs to grant.

Good grief, Maher performs on pay TV. He gets to say whatever he fucking wants in that venue. If you don’t like it – turn him off, cancel HBO, blowup your TV – just please stop whining. Save the self-righteous indignation for when Trump starts trying to control web content. (That would be now.)

Perhaps, the one interesting aspect to the Comedians Gone Wild week is that Bill Maher managed to generate as much right-wing attention with a single word as Kathy generated by sitting through a full photo-shoot. It’s ironic how, even at the bottom of shock comedy, women must work much harder than men just to be competitive.

Nevertheless, the republic needs comedic breaks from the Shakespearean tragedy playing out in the White House. It seems to go on forever. Hell, Macbeth only took one-hundred-ninety-two pages and we’ve already lived through two-hundred-seven days of post-election Trump imposed obscenity.

Nothing that any comedian can ever say will be as offensive as the Donald.

In Peace and Justice,
osv