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.
He’s a well known polticial commentator and talkshow host, known for the shows “Politically Incorrect” and “Real Time with Bill Maher”.
Ahh I see thanks for the info - I’m not from the US so I’ve not come across those shows. They sound awful. Are they as full of right wing apologist talking points as they sound ?
Believe it or not, he made his name as a wry liberalist, antagonising established conservatives (and Democrats).
I’ve only watched some Real Time, in the early days it was kind of interesting, but it quickly becomes clear he holds conservative ideals. Nowadays he’s mostly a talking puppet for the conservatives. He strikes me as one or two rungs below Sean Hannity.
Yeah my vibe was always that he went Democrat because he was a contrarian, an atheist, and smart enough to understand how ridiculous republican economic policies were. But it’s crystal clear he has no love for marginalized people or the working class and thinks that if he doesn’t understand something it’s ridiculous and that if he pisses people off that means he’s right and speaking truth to power.
I don’t know, he always came across as a creep to me, even when he was “left wing”
I’d say more “smarmy” than “creepy”. Not that that’s better.
I think kinda both. He feels like the sorta guy who’d coerce a yes out of someone who clearly doesn’t want to do stuff with him.
I remember him talking about how much he loves to fuck with some uncomfortable guests. He’d say things like 'its what makes life worth it’s
How odd and interesting. Who do you reckon is the main audience for his shows? 🤔
My suspicion is his audience is the “smarter than thou” “centrists”. People who think both sides are the same and miss the Clinton administration. They probably on average think race was a non issue except people on the left keep making it one, they’re not pro union but support an amount of social safety, they may be cool with gay people but think that trans is too far (though they probably don’t like that pride is still a thing), probably support abortion but think it’s too common… And overwhelmingly his audience likely thinks they’re smarter than they are.
Don’t know about interesting, I’m guessing he got paid and thought “fuck you, I got mine” as conservatives are wont to do.
I haven’t watched in many years, but back then he geared himself towards “intellectuals”, but as the politics have become more polarised and the messaging dumbed down, maybe “middle class conservative” is more his brand.
Don’t know about actual viewership though, only his presentation.
Last I checked, his audience was those self-proclaimed “intellectuals”. The kind of atheists who define their identity by dunking on religious people, and the kind of mediocre people who feel superior by laughing others.
People who look at cherry-picked and out-of-context examples of progressivism and then dismiss the entirety as anti-science wokeness. People who cherry-pick scientific beliefs (without deeper research) in the same way most religious people cherry-pick passages from their holy text. Take the (out-of-context) quotes that reaffirm what you already belief in, ignore the rest, and most importantly: Declare that your “truth” is superior to others.
I imagine the audience of his shows has changed a lot in recent years. HBO went from HBO Go and Now to HBO MAX, which excluded a LOT of customers for a year while they negotiated with Roku and LG. Then HBO changed programming a lot. All the while Bill Maher started using more anti-woke talking points, and Twitter fell apart, this all shakes up who would listen to Bill.
I’ve seen snippets of Politically Incorrect from the 90s, as there were a few guests I was interested in. It seemed to be just another talk show, not right wing apologist at all. I’m chiming in just so you get an idea of the long career on air this man has, he’s been decades on tv.
Whatever he’s said recently that may have caused a reaction, I’m also out of the loop. I’m also not from the US.
I’m also not from the US but I’ve been watching Real Time for many years and I think it’s a great show. He’s an outspoken democrat (at least since the Trump era).
And while he does invite on republicans and right-wing guests, he’s usually quite critical when interviewing them.
But I guess just talking to people makes you an “apologist” in the eyes of some people.
I don’t even care about his political views much. They’re mostly the sort of thing you would expect from your typical selfish Boomer. I’m more concerned about his health views. Apart from vaccine “skepticism,” there’s other medical woo. I never liked him much, but I watched his show for the great guests. Then one day he had on the so-called doctor from Mexico who claimed to have cured Charlie Sheen’s HIV and didn’t push back on a single bullshit claim. I never watched his show again. If that hadn’t done it, his vaccine position would have done it by the time COVID rolled around, but this was years before.
Also, as a former professional stand-up, I absolutely hated the way he berated his audience when a joke fell flat. That’s like the number one never do.
Yeah he used to be pretty decent to watch but now he is just neoliberal, asshole, rich white dude who is completely out of touch with the people who used to watch his show.
Don’t get me wrong, he has my respect for grilling so many right wingers. But he gave a deliberate platform to anti-trans talking points. No pushback provided. And I really hate him for that. He has since gotten much more right-wing in his New Rules. I felt like I was being scolded for being a leftist and enjoying the show. By the show’s host.
Fair enough fair enough. Do you know what’s going on with him somehow breaking the writers strike?
He’s a malignant narcissist who can’t stand being out of the spotlight that long. He’s been saying bad things about the WGA strike since it started. It was only a matter of time before he crossed the picket line.
No, I don’t really follow him personally and the show is in break, so no idea.
Fair fair thanks for the context tho - appreciate it my dude
