I have seen this man before but I do not know who he is
The other commenters covered it but before Politically Incorrect and Real Time he was a minor comedian in the 80s. He did standup, bit parts on a few TV shows, and I think he got a movie.
So he had a career to speak of before he became primarily a political commentator. His standup act was very reactionary and critical of the “growing trend” (at the time) of political correctness/basic human decency, which is how he got his first show.
Edit: Oh, I forgot to mention he is somewhat left-leaning. He claims to be a liberal, or rather people claim he is, but his stances are all over the place. He’s mostly cultivated a brand of a smug asshole who would call out hypocrisy while being hypocritical…but it’s “okay” because he’s open about being a hypocrite?
He tried to fill the role of THE democrat-hard-hitting-common-sense-political-comedian but was quickly overtaken by Jon Stewart on The Daily Show. In my opinion Bill Maher never truly fulfilled that role because he lacks empathy.
Also, it should be noted that he was an antivaxer for a while.
Oh, I forgot to mention he is somewhat left-leaning.
He’s not really a left leaning person IMO, just anti-religion and pro-pot.
On the last episode I watched of his show he had a twenty minute gripe session about how COVID affected the partial ownership of some ball club he had. I think that was what it was but I don’t 100% remember anymore because he sounded so fucking out of touch I turned it off.
So basically imagine a bad takes factory. That’s him. He’s an actual liberal elitist who seems hell bent on being a condescending jackass who’s rarely right
He used to make the occasional refreshing point… decades ago on politically incorrect.
The one that lost him that role honestly, pointing out that you can call the 9/11 suicide attackers a lot of things, deluded, fanatical, etc, but cowards doesn’t fit and there are plenty of derogatory concepts that fit, just not cowards.
I like when people point out that language and words have meanings and your enemies aren’t just all the bad words you know.
Since those days though, his politics shifted rightward from somewhat progressive to Neoliberal in the early days of Real Time to Conservative about 10 years ago, while still calling himself a real progressive. In recent years he’s been doing shrieking the opposite of his once insightful 9/11 point and telling anyone who will listen that all followers of Islam are a dangerous extremist group and a wholesale threat to civilization.
I stopped being able to stand tuning into him years ago.
20 years ago he was the only talking head that was atheist and given any mainstream time. I don’t know much about him other than that and I don’t think he does anything very interesting but I think a lot of people still have him sort of bookmarked for how he was in the early 2000s
I’ve tried to stay out of controversial topics on Lemmy for my sanity, but I get the sense that many commenters haven’t watched much of Bill Maher (not just in this thread). I’ve watched him pretty regularly for years, so I have a fair amount of context. I’m about as lefty as it gets fwiw (not a libertarian).
Here’s the way I’ve interpreted Bill Mahers perspective and belief system: he’s a very intelligent, well-informed yet blunt asshole, who genuinely says what he believes, even if it doesn’t fit in a box that’s on a recognizable political spectrum. He is willing to have frank discussions about issues that other arms of the media are afraid to touch, even though he knows it will piss off a big chunk of the public.
He has some opinions that I find appalling, but I very much respect the way he conducts himself and the way he exposes the voices of some truly poisonous people in society, as well as some truly heroic and often lesser known activists and community leaders.
I believe people need to be seen and heard to be understood, and Maher will talk to anyone and try to understand their point of view so it gets some oxygen. Because of that, he has had some terrible people as guests on his show. Though I’ll concede his interviews can be a bit inconsistent, he’s usually pretty relentless in trying to pull the real shit out of people.
I’ve seen some comments that he is conservative. He is not. Please watch a few episodes and report back. He TALKS to conservatives, but clearly is not one. He’s also not what we might call a liberal these days, but that label might have applied to him a decade ago. Now he’s mostly just a skeptic with a traditional left-leaning perspective, but he’s one of the few out there willing to engage with extremists on the right.
He’s a complex individual, and there is a lot of reductionism when talking about Maher. Like I said, he holds some beliefs that make me very uncomfortable, but he’s a great example of the fact that the world is not black and white, and not everybody fits into a neat little box.
It might help if he was slightly less of an asshole, but that’s a big part of his schtick. I value his voice, and hope he stays on the air for a long time.
But also, don’t scab, that’s not cool.
I’m glad to hear from someone else who actually watched Bill Maher. I even kept watching after he dropped the N word to shock an interviewed guest.
But I think in some more recent episodes his pushback against his audience being “too sensitive” and “woke” has been misguided. He’s platformed a ton of grifters since then. His show became downright exhausting, compared to the fun I used to have. He’s bringing on LGB not the T anti-trans grifters. He’s constantly whining about California. The jokes and in-between segments that used to lighten the tension have gotten super corny. The New Rule at the end has him preaching absolute shit.
Absolutely. The way he treats his audience is one of the things that bothers me, and his view on trans folks is another one that I find pretty abhorrent. So yeah, great examples. I still think he brings a valuable and unique voice to an otherwise homogenous and unchallenging discourse.
What discourse: Trans issues? Progressivism? Since then I’ve gone so far left. I think I started with The Young Turks. It’s a lot harder to find people who are having fun and making jokes about leftist issues, though, and that’s one reason I’m here on Lemmy.
I mean discourse in the most general sense. Not specific topics per se, but the way we talk about and engage with societal issues that are not always cut and dry.
I think he’s what we need a lot more of in this country, thoughtful, honest, well intentioned. Regardless of what we may think on an individual topic, being able to discuss it and not being locked into the confines of two radical ideologies is sorely missing in today’s society.
Bingo. Couldn’t agree more.
Very well said. He’s a free thinker that has no bias and for that I respect him.
He’s still doing a couple of podcasts I believe. One being political and the other about chilling with a guest while getting lit.
