Bill Maher Blames PC Movement and Failure to Confront Islam

[agent00f]

And?

Many of those who say "both sides equally bad" and so on seem to assume the rest of us are stupid dups, too. And while not everyone who think that way are equally correct, they're not entirely wrong, either.

For example, many of us do take what they say seriously to some degree. Even construct elaborate arguments of why they're wrong, when they never really cared in the first place; it's all a troll to them, some more aware of it than others. You should be able to understand this better than anyone, so I thought it was worth pointing out that Maher's particularly defect here is a trait he shares with the conservatives.

 

[agent00f]

While the "PC culture" in the campus indeed has its issues with intolerance and what not, I have my doubt that those working class voters in the rust belt and rural voters across the country were motivated to vote Trump because of the college PC cultre. My hunch is that they are not even aware of what those controversial incidents in the college were, just like majority of Americans who do not care much about what happens in college campuses. Interesting in this regard is that Trump himself rarely told his audience exactly what "PC" even means. He simply repeated "Political Correctness is killing us!" without what the real world examples of PC were. Angry folks project and denounce anything that pisses them off as PC.

Same goes for the extremist Muslim terrorism. Those rural/rust belt voters live in remarkably homogenous environments. It is unlikely they interact in day-to-day lives with a person of Muslim faith who subscribe to its radical sectarian ideologies. Could it, nonetheless, scare them? Of course. But mostly because of the fanning of Trump and Alt-right, the latter of which has kept pushing false and exaggerated narratives of what is happening in Europe. Domestically we do not even know the exact motive of the Pulse nightclub shooter. Maher beef is a much more liberal one in that he views many of Islam's doctrines incompatible with liberal democracy. (e.g. misogyny) The Trump voters are much more scared of so-called "Sharia Law" being imposed on U.S. citizenry, thanks again to Alt-Right and Trumpian propaganda.

Maher is wrong on both counts. Ask a Trump voter what they think PC means. More often than not you will hear generic rants against the liberals and the lefties. It is not what Maher thinks it is. They might find more common ground in rejecting radical Islamic terrorism, but they get there from very different originating places.

Edit: I missed the last paragraph, where he says:



That is a credible argument. Maybe I misunderstood the first part of his diagnosis as well. It is a reasonable argument that the liberals neglected the working class voters. But I do not think these voters had a particular animosity against PC. It is a liberal fantasy to think these voters cared about a lunatic PC warrior crying about someone else's Holloween costume.

Maher can identify with the conservatives here due to two simple reasons:

1. He hates religion, so he identifies with anyone else who hates any religion, even if they're religious
2. He gets shit sometimes for saying insensitive things, and instead of acting like a big boy and making his case, he acts like a conservative with all that righteous indignation so he identifies there, too.

He does have a point in that conservatives really don't like muslims and same for PC, but that's hardly news.

 

[Double Trouble]

I don't think many people voted for Trump because he wasn't Politically Correct. I mean I do think a backlash against the PC culture helped his victory, but it wasn't a direct relationship.

Where the PC backlash comes in is the left tried to disqualify Trump based on their PC view of him (he said this offensive thing or that offensive thing) with the maximum amount of incredulity they could muster. But by and large half the America voters shrugged off that argument, and the press rewarded Trump every time he smashed the Overton window with even more coverage therefore creating a motivation for him to do it again.

We saw that liberal frustration expressed when Clinton couldn't understand why she wasn't 50 points ahead of Trump in the polls after he said "bad" things. The way the left plays the PC game you are instantly written off as a person if you say offensive things, and she couldn't gasp the concept that the big PC pen that writes people off basically had invisible ink to a huge chunk of America that doesn't live on either coast because they themselves can't live by such strict standards in their locker rooms or bars. That invisible ink in the face of a PC culture that demands to be recognized is a direct backlash to the movement that Trump did benefit from.

Not understanding that PC backlash screwed the entire Democratic strategy from the start. In the primaries some on the left wanted him to win the R nomination because they felt his statements would tear down the whole Republican Party. They didn't understand they were playing with fire and it cost them. Towards the end of her campaign there was agreement across the left that surely everyone had heard their warning about Trump and there was no need to put forth her own vision because Trump being offensive outdid all of Clinton's scandals or even the need for her to put forth her own radical ideas for change. People would pick the lessor evil, which PC rules defined as Clinton. The idea that people would have any other concerns about the election other than that was shrugged off as partisanship.

Why I think the anti-PC part of Trump's victory matters more today compared to some of the other issues that got Trump elected is because with all the other issues (such as people losing factory jobs) the left is having no trouble sympathizing with those people in the postmortem analysis. Yet the PC backlash the left still cannot understand to this day, because they cannot even comprehend how most rational people didn't write off Trump when they did. Rather than trying to understand why some people aren't moving as fast socially in society as people on the left coast do, a huge chunk of people want to write off more than half the electorate as racists. To me that sounds as crazy and reductionist as almost any campaign promise Trump is gonna back off from now that he got elected.

This is well put. My sister is one of the people described in this post. To her, it was simply inconceivable that anyone could vote for Trump after hearing the offensive things he said. I found some of the things Trump said stupid and offensive, but that doesn't automatically mean the other candidate is better. I live in Ohio, and we were bombarded with 24x7 commercials from both parties. The Hillary ones focused on one thing and one thing only: "Trump is a meanie, look at all the nasty things he said!". There was no focus at all on any issues that regular folks might care about, just pounding the message into everyone's head that Trump said offensive things. They just failed to make a good case FOR Hillary, and failed to make a case against Trump other than "he said offensive things!". That just doesn't cut it, and in the end Ohio went easily for Trump. Many on the left including many on this forum have tried to blame people being secretly racist as the reason for Hillary losing, but that's just bullshit; unless you want to believe the same people who voted by a wide margin for a black president now all of a sudden won't vote for his selected successor because they secretly love racist Trump.

poofyhairguy, you're the first one I've seen articulate that the left has come to grips with many other possible drivers of Trump votes but has yet to come to grips with the PC backlash. It wasn't the one driving factor, but it was one of many factors that led to Hillary's defeat. In the aftermath of the election, many democrats attribute the rust belt defeats to racism of white voters, but in doing so are just further alienating the swing voters. Just because I'm white and didn't vote for Hillary doesn't mean I'm racist, sexist or whatever other politically incorrect label you want to attach. Maybe I held my nose and voted for a candidate I didn't like because the alternative was a candidate I didn't trust.

 

[agent00f]

This is well put. My sister is one of the people described in this post. To her, it was simply inconceivable that anyone could vote for Trump after hearing the offensive things he said. I found some of the things Trump said stupid and offensive, but that doesn't automatically mean the other candidate is better. I live in Ohio, and we were bombarded with 24x7 commercials from both parties. The Hillary ones focused on one thing and one thing only: "Trump is a meanie, look at all the nasty things he said!". There was no focus at all on any issues that regular folks might care about, just pounding the message into everyone's head that Trump said offensive things. They just failed to make a good case FOR Hillary, and failed to make a case against Trump other than "he said offensive things!". That just doesn't cut it, and in the end Ohio went easily for Trump. Many on the left including many on this forum have tried to blame people being secretly racist as the reason for Hillary losing, but that's just bullshit; unless you want to believe the same people who voted by a wide margin for a black president now all of a sudden won't vote for his selected successor because they secretly love racist Trump.

poofyhairguy, you're the first one I've seen articulate that the left has come to grips with many other possible drivers of Trump votes but has yet to come to grips with the PC backlash. It wasn't the one driving factor, but it was one of many factors that led to Hillary's defeat. In the aftermath of the election, many democrats attribute the rust belt defeats to racism of white voters, but in doing so are just further alienating the swing voters. Just because I'm white and didn't vote for Hillary doesn't mean I'm racist, sexist or whatever other politically incorrect label you want to attach. Maybe I held my nose and voted for a candidate I didn't like because the alternative was a candidate I didn't trust.

I think really disliking people of lower social status taking your jerbs sounds a lot worse than disliking Hillary because she, well, who the fuck really cares.

But otoh you're right that politics involves the art of allowing people in bad situations to save face. Consider that political correctness was one of those tools. But that's got a branding issue now so maybe time to concoct a new one.

 

[justoh]

Was afraid to watch maher last week, expecting only whining.

If the left doesn't abandon pc craziness and stop supporting Islam, both very important to the true liberals like maher (though not most democrats), then they'll just continue to lose.

Stop discouraging liberals from voting, democrats!

 

[FIVR]

Really, what race do Muslims actually belong to?, and if one decides to convert from Islam to Christian, Buddhism, Scientology, etc. or even call themselves an atheist or agnostic do they magically lose this special racial identity no one seems to be able to actually quantify?

When you equate religion with race, in this case Islam, you elevate that religion above other religions whether you know it or not because one can choose their religion but you can't choose your race no more than you can choose your biological family.

I expect such stupidity from some conservative brain defective from West Virginia but as Bill Maher has pointed out and this election has shown liberals can be worse even though they claim to know better.

I'm not going to debate with you about whether "muslim" is a race. My point is he has his own biases and personal dislike for muslims, and I'm sure he thinks he can tell who is a muslim (and who isn't) just by looking. Personally, I ascribe his hatred to his own fervent support for Israel, which is a racist apartheid state and support for the Israeli state necessitates some degree of moral vacuity, along with a dislike for the many things which "muslims" are held responsible for in the west .


Let me be clear: Your belief (or lack thereof) in a religion does not somehow make you personally responsible for the acts of other people who believe in broadly the same myth. That is collective responsibility for belief and it is a short step from collective punishment. States that practice collective punishment, such as Israel and the former Baathist regimes, lack morality.

Maher is a racist, or a bigot if you choose to make the "hur dur muslim is not a race" argument.

 

[justoh]

Maher does seem a little too pro israel, and seems a little too uncritical on the whole constant drone attack thing. On the other hand, he has a healthy disrespect for religion, which is the most important thing, after all?

 

[readymix]

My octogenarian aunt, retired po neighbor and auto mechanic, unknown to each other, by rote, reply; the border, pc, muslims, commies. uncannily mechanical responses.

 

[vi edit]

Mansplaining....there's another word added to my dictionary this election cycle.

File it next to optics, surrogate, and bigly.

 

[lopri]

poofyhairguy, you're the first one I've seen articulate that the left has come to grips with many other possible drivers of Trump votes but has yet to come to grips with the PC backlash. It wasn't the one driving factor, but it was one of many factors that led to Hillary's defeat. In the aftermath of the election, many democrats attribute the rust belt defeats to racism of white voters, but in doing so are just further alienating the swing voters. Just because I'm white and didn't vote for Hillary doesn't mean I'm racist, sexist or whatever other politically incorrect label you want to attach. Maybe I held my nose and voted for a candidate I didn't like because the alternative was a candidate I didn't trust.

I have heard a couple of similar accounts from real life Trump voters. Unlike AT racist trolls, they told me they were uncomfortable with what Trump said during the campaign. They still went for Trump because they thought a drastic change was needed in the D.C. even though they did not like his dog whistles. They also had extremely negative opinions on Hillary Clinton.

The election was close. Especially those rust belt states are won by razor thin margins. A lot of voters in those states were also late deciders. That tells me the country did not turn racist wholesale, and there are persuadable middle who wishes to change the horses when they perceive things are not going well.

 

[poofyhairguy]

Mansplaining....there's another word added to my dictionary this election cycle.

File it next to optics, surrogate, and bigly.

Mine are revanchist, safe spaces, and checking privilege.

 

[vi edit]

Yes, safe space is another. Never heard revanchist. That's a new one.

 

[realibrad]

I am glad this idea is spreading. Long ago the Right let the extreme voice take over the party. Its why so few on the Right identify as moderate. The Left is letting their voice be lead by extremists more and more, and those who identify as moderate are turning out. I think Ana's response is exactly the problem. Instead of explaining why she disagrees, she "oh, you think the problem is we don't try to appeal to white males more? To a white person, equality feels like oppression". That was in response to Mahr saying that white working men were being told that their problems were not real. Instead of explaining why that is not the case, she pulls out the idea that white people are just angry that others are getting equality and feel oppressed.

 

[agent00f]

I have heard a couple of similar accounts from real life Trump voters. Unlike AT racist trolls, they told me they were uncomfortable with what Trump said during the campaign. They still went for Trump because they thought a drastic change was needed in the D.C. even though they did not like his dog whistles. They also had extremely negative opinions on Hillary Clinton.

The election was close. Especially those rust belt states are won by razor thin margins. A lot of voters in those states were also late deciders. That tells me the country did not turn racist wholesale, and there are persuadable middle who wishes to change the horses when they perceive things are not going well.

Nobody is saying the country suddenly turned racist wholesale, it was always pretty bigoted and you only have to look at history for an overabundance of evidence. Trump simply managed to engage with/bring out that resentment, which flipped uneducated whites an unprecedented +14% to his side, which turned out rather important in key states. Any other Republican unwilling to make bigotry their core plank would've lost.

People seem to be using voting for obama as a counterargument. Obama is Mr. Harvard Law with a skin condition, not Miguel climbing a fence to get at a shitty job. Spoiled brats looking to validate their station in life are obviously more comfortable picking on one than the other.

Case in point:

I am glad this idea is spreading. Long ago the Right let the extreme voice take over the party. Its why so few on the Right identify as moderate. The Left is letting their voice be lead by extremists more and more, and those who identify as moderate are turning out. I think Ana's response is exactly the problem. Instead of explaining why she disagrees, she "oh, you think the problem is we don't try to appeal to white males more? To a white person, equality feels like oppression". That was in response to Mahr saying that white working men were being told that their problems were not real. Instead of explaining why that is not the case, she pulls out the idea that white people are just angry that others are getting equality and feel oppressed.

Consider the reason to build such a wall is to keep out less worthy people, like a gated community. That's the height of privileged thinking.

Now at first it may not seem a lot of these white jobs are great, but consider what they're making (trumpsters average 70k household) vs their skillset compared to most of the world, or even many minorities in the same country. Seems like that's something they'd want to protect. If anything, they're too privilege to even see what the critics are talking about, or at least pretend that way.

 

[realibrad]

Nobody is saying the country suddenly turned racist wholesale, it was always pretty bigoted and you only have to look at history for an overabundance of evidence. Trump simply managed to engage with/bring out that resentment, which flipped uneducated whites an unprecedented +14% to his side, which turned out rather important in key states. Any other Republican unwilling to make bigotry their core plank would've lost.

People seem to be using voting for obama as a counterargument. Obama is Mr. Harvard Law with a skin condition, not Miguel climbing a fence to get at a shitty job. Spoiled brats looking to validate their station in life are obviously more comfortable picking on one than the other.

Case in point:



Consider the reason to build such a wall is to keep out less worthy people, like a gated community. That's the height of privileged thinking.

Now at first it may not seem a lot of these white jobs are great, but consider what they're making (trumpsters average 70k household) vs their skillset compared to most of the world, or even many minorities in the same country. Seems like that's something they'd want to protect. If anything, they're too privilege to even see what the critics are talking about, or at least pretend that way.

So Obama won, twice, because people were racist but nobody tapped into it. Their racism would not drive them to vote against a black man, twice, because nobody stirred the pot. Trump won, because he stirred the racist pot, to beat another white person. It was also Trump racism that made Black and Latino people vote for Hillary less. Trump was so racist, that minorities decided they would not vote for Hillary. Had Hillary just pointed out how racist everyone was, maybe minorities would have realized that not voting for her was wrong.

 

[agent00f]

So Obama won, twice, because people were racist but nobody tapped into it. Their racism would not drive them to vote against a black man, twice, because nobody stirred the pot. Trump won, because he stirred the racist pot, to beat another white person. It was also Trump racism that made Black and Latino people vote for Hillary less. Trump was so racist, that minorities decided they would not vote for Hillary. Had Hillary just pointed out how racist everyone was, maybe minorities would have realized that not voting for her was wrong.

Remember that Trump tried to show his predecessors the way, but gop wouldn't listen, so he had to prove it to them by doing it himself. Btw, nobody doubts that Obama's order of magnitude greater charisma than Clinton comes in handy in a popularity contest, not even you.

 

[buckshot24]

Bill Maher should probably go back to comedy. He was reasonably good at that.

Something we can agree on.

 

[disappoint]

Mansplaining....there's another word added to my dictionary this election cycle.

File it next to optics, surrogate, and bigly.

Optics? One of these is not like the others. Unless optics means something other than objects made out of materials with higher indices of refraction than air in order to direct the flow of photons in a more desired direction.

 

[poofyhairguy]

Unless optics means something other than objects made out of materials with higher indices of refraction than air in order to direct the flow of photons in a more desired direction.

It does.

Optics in a political sense means "how something looks to the general public."

It matters because it can shape policy in seemingly non-rational ways.

I love the concept myself and have used it for years.

 

[disappoint]

It does.

Optics in a political sense means "how something looks to the general public."

It matters because it can shape policy in seemingly non-rational ways.

I love the concept myself and have used it for years.

Why not just call it perception?

 

[Jaskalas]

because they cannot even comprehend how most rational people didn't write off Trump when they did.

Because a lot of the !@#$ slung at Trump are half truths or outright lies.
And it continues to be demonstrated in the "omfg he ate without us!" crowd.
If he ordered a rack of ribs they'd write headlines "Trump the baby-slayer".

All that noise made people either offended, or tuned out.
The sycophant crowd was slightly smaller than estimated.

 

[First]

I'm sure there were a lot of people that voted out of spite, with "PC culture" being one of the things they're spiteful of. Of course, I don't think the Seinfeld defense is a good way to decide who to vote for. In fact it definitely isn't a good way to vote, as we're about to see during these next *up to* 4 yrs.

 

[Blackjack200]

I have heard a couple of similar accounts from real life Trump voters. Unlike AT racist trolls, they told me they were uncomfortable with what Trump said during the campaign. They still went for Trump because they thought a drastic change was needed in the D.C. even though they did not like his dog whistles. They also had extremely negative opinions on Hillary Clinton.

Nobody is racist, just ask them!

"Yeah, I really didn't like when he called Mexicans rapists, and then it turned out that he was the rapist all along, but I voted for him anyway because something something Washington."

The election was close. Especially those rust belt states are won by razor thin margins. A lot of voters in those states were also late deciders. That tells me the country did not turn racist wholesale, and there are persuadable middle who wishes to change the horses when they perceive things are not going well.

Damn, a lot of those voters went racist at the last second!

 

[realibrad]

Remember that Trump tried to show his predecessors the way, but gop wouldn't listen, so he had to prove it to them by doing it himself. Btw, nobody doubts that Obama's order of magnitude greater charisma than Clinton comes in handy in a popularity contest, not even you.

First, I will point out that your argument is that people are racist enough to vote for Trump over white Hillary, but not racist enough so that Obama could win...twice. You actually believe that Obama was so amazing that he was able to get over racism twice but Hillary could not get the same whites to vote for her. Lets take a look at the exit polls.

http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tan...s-victory-divisions-by-race-gender-education/

Lets see how Trump did with White educated voters.

Two-thirds (67%) of non-college whites backed Trump, compared with just 28% who supported Clinton, resulting in a 39-point advantage for Trump among this group.

Man, that is a big gap eh. What was it like for Obama?

Though a modest educational gap has been present among white voters since the 2000 election, over the past few decades, both whites with and without college degrees have consistently backed Republican candidates over Democrats. For example, according to the 2012 exit polls, Obama lost both the white college vote to Romney by 14 points (56% vs. 42%), and the white non-college vote by an even wider 26-point margin (62% vs. 36%).

Wow, so Obama lost by only 26 points vs Clinton who lost by 39 points. But wait, Romney got 62% of that demo, and trump got 67%. But you said he flipped 14% of the uneducated white vote. He did not flip them, he flipped 5% of that demo. But, if Obama lost by 26 points, and Clinton lost by 39 points (13% difference) then what happened.

If this were race more so than last time, how did white voters vote last time?

White non-Hispanic voters preferred Trump over Clinton by 21 percentage points (58% to 37%), according to the exit poll conducted by Edison Research for the National Election Pool. Romney won whites by 20 percentage points in 2012 (59% to 39%).

Wait, so if Trump stirred the race pot, then what did Romney do, because those numbers are almost the same. It sure looks like Trump lost a few votes, but Clinton lost a lot more. The race demographics seem to be pretty stable vs the last election.

Lets take a look at this graph.

Well damn. It sure looks like Black people did not show up for Clinton. Its almost like your belief that Trump got out the race vote is not backed by the data. It sure looks more like Clinton was not popular with people who normally vote Democrat.

 

[poofyhairguy]

Why not just call it perception?

Perception is different.

Perception is "what you the person sees/believes." For example- Many people have the perception Donald Trump is a racist based on his provable actions and words. Some don't agree with that perspective but either way the viewpoint is based on a collection of facts.

Optics is "what it looks like to everyone." Example- Bill meeting Loretta and talking in private right before the Justice Department decided whether to go after Hillary had terrible optics. Maybe they said nothing about the situation, and we don't have facts either way. But pretty much anyone admits it looks bad. That is optics.