# Bill Maher drops the nigger bomb **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 3, 2017, 10:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-maher-drops-the-nigger-bomb/787991 "2017-06-03T10:21:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 14
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2017, 11:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-maher-drops-the-nigger-bomb/787991/261 "2017-06-11T11:28:56Z")
A few more thoughts. The first is, very few of us can claim to be without biases. Most of us have biases, if we’re really being honest. I think the boundary between having biases and being a bigot is whether or not a person allows those biases to affect how they think of and interact with other people. So while I might have biased thoughts toward a particular group of people, I first of all try to acknowledge that these biases exist. And then I try to ask why I have them, and what I can do to treat people more fairly. A bigot doesn’t do these things. A true racist or someone with extreme prejudice is perfectly satisfied with his biases and tries to defend them and rationalize them. I don’t see that in Bill Maher. Maher was confronted because Black people (and others) who understandably don’t want Maher or anyone to ever be comfortable using that word and that type of language, even as a joke. It’s a zero-tolerance policy, and it’s understandable given the history of this society. That being said, I think we should also allow some space for a person to have an honest appraisal of a culture. Usually, when we’re talking about “racism” we’re in fact talking beyond race. What we’re really talking about – at least in a lot of cases, though not all – is culture. I’ve seen the posts about Bill Maher’s Islamophobia, but I don’t think that Bill is inherently anti-Muslim. He’s not the type of person who argues that Muslims don’t have rights. He is critiquing aspects of Islam as it is practiced in many parts of the world, and there is nothing inherently wrong with that in my view. The fact is that radical ideology is far to prevalent throughout the Muslim world. To be sure, radical Christian ideology is also far too prevalent, but Maher actually criticizes that pretty harshly as well, so I see him being pretty fair in that regard. His movie Religulous dedicated a lot of time mocking Christian fundamentalism as I recall. ---
**Author:** ![asahi](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asahi/32/8693_2.png) [@asahi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asahi)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2017, 11:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-maher-drops-the-nigger-bomb/787991/262 "2017-06-11T11:45:38Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > I see no reason to believe Maher bears any negative feelings towards black people, but I do remember some of the kind of jokes that Ice Cube mentioned (he said this isn’t the first time Maher skirted the line of racism) - for example, I recall Maher wishing that Obama would “go gangsta” or “be blacker” when dealing with his Republican critics. Even if he doesn’t mean any harm by it, those are jokes that reiterate a stereotype (black people as dangerous or threatening) that has done a lot of harm. > > Not the end of the world, and I still like his show, but Friday’s show brought back to me some of those jokes I found problematic. It’s a very fine line that Bill Maher walks, and he has made a career out of it. I think there is a place for someone to be “politically incorrect”, if we are talking about someone who occasionally addresses taboo subjects. Not for sport or giggles, but to open up a thread of discussion and have honest discourse about sensitive topics. The challenge facing Maher is that, as he said, the mind of a comic can go into weird places. Historically, comedy has been an avenue to use humor to raise the profile of very sobering topics. The danger for Maher is that his humor can be taken the wrong way, and he can be accused of making light of the very uncomfortable subjects he’s actually trying to get ordinary people to discuss more openly. I obviously can’t speak for Ice Cube and the other guests who confronted Maher but I think they appeared on his show and confronted him not because they felt like they were confronting a hardcore bigot. I think they get that Maher is one of the good guys. But their point is, if the good guys are allowed to get away with using this sort of language, if we permit allies in the fight against racism to feel comfortable using the language of racists, then we what does that say? The fear is that it might normalize the use of racist discourse, which is not what we need. Having said that, I also think it’s prudent for all people, including a rapper like Ice Cube who claims it’s “their word now”, to consider whether it’s wise to use it themselves. Again, if the argument is that normalizing the use of the word has a corrosive effect, then maybe nobody should be using it unless there’s a specific contextually defensible reason for doing so. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2017, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-maher-drops-the-nigger-bomb/787991/263 "2017-06-11T13:07:36Z")
> [@Reluctant\_A](#): > > “We” know this? You have a mouse in your pocket? Is Professor X sitting next to you? Who is we? “We” is anyone who has any substantive familiarity with Bill Maher and his background and history. Such as his long-time viewers, and friends like Michael Eric Dyson who was on the show last Friday to “school” him about why his use of the word was wrong. Dyson is a Georgetown University sociology professor, a New York Times contributing opinion writer, a contributing editor of The New Republic, and a published author, most pertinently of the recent book “Tears We Cannot Stop: A Sermon to White America” about the subtle and often unconscious aspects of white privilege. And Dyson’s point was about why Maher’s remark was harmful even when the intention was harmless, and that it underlined his point about white privilege _ **precisely because** _ Maher is someone known to stand up for the rights of black people and is so clearly the antithesis of a racist; the point that Dyson made repeatedly is that if someone as staunchly anti-racist as Maher can slip into this kind of transgression, what hope is there for the rest of us – and thus most of society has a long way to go to obliterate unconscious racism. > [@Reluctant\_A](#): > > Let me put it this way: I don’t know that Bill Maher is racist, but I don’t know that Bill Maher _isn’t_ racist, either. That’s correct, it appears that you don’t know anything about Bill Maher. > [@Reluctant\_A](#): > > What I _do_ know, and I’ll go to the bank with this, is that Bill Maher isn’t the “furthest thing” from a racist. I don’t know how anybody can listen to any of his Islamophobic rants and say confidently to themselves, “There ain’t no way in hell _that_ dude is racist!” Like, he might hate all religions, but he doesn’t go in on all religions with the same fervor that he goes in on Islam. So you’ve given this a good deal of thought, and you’ve concluded that there is no difference between Islam and any other religion, particularly in how said religion is used in support of violent political activism – you can just find no difference whatsoever, is that correct? So “Islamist extremism” is just a figment of someone’s imagination? > [@Snowboarder\_Bo](#): > > > [@Reluctant\_A](#): > > > > Like, he might hate all religions, but he doesn’t go in on all religions with the same fervor that he goes in on Islam. > > Amen, brother! It’s not like Bill Maher ever made a movie that slams Christianity or Judaism, amirite? Good point. People unfamiliar with Bill Maher have probably never seen “Religulous”, or even heard of it. Or probably never heard his many comments slamming Christian fundamentalists and others of that ilk. ---
**Author:** ![Sherrerd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sherrerd/32/8_2.png) [@Sherrerd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sherrerd)\ **Post date:** [June 11, 2017, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-maher-drops-the-nigger-bomb/787991/264 "2017-06-11T22:10:02Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > … From my perspective, he heard a funny comment (“come work in the fields with us”) and his comedic mind came up with a funny rejoinder. As I said earlier, Malcolm X made the “house Negro / field Negro” association back in the 60s, and others have pointed out that it may go back earlier to _Gone With the Wind_. If he’s on a mission to offend black people, how come we don’t hear about it more often, like we do about his views on Islamist extremism? … When watching the original broadcast my reaction was ‘he’s referencing the scene from _Gone With the Wind_’—the one that shows Scarlett, after managing to get back to her ravaged-by-war family home, trying to scrounge some sustenance for the exhausted and hungry group. I’m not seeing the movie quote online, but it’s something like: Pork (elderly slave): The Yankees took everything. Scarlett O’Hara: There must be something left in the fields that we can cook to feed these hungry people. You will have to go out and find something. Pork: But Miss Scarlett, we’re \*house \*servants! I’m pretty sure that the 1939 movie used “house servants” instead of “house n\_\_\_\_” —the construction that appeared in the novel. Again, it’s Scarlett and Pork discussing what could be found to eat: > [@](#): > > “All right, go on. Any stock left?” > “No’m. Nuthin’ ‘cept one ole sow an’ her litter. Ah driv dem inter de swamp de day de Yankees come, but de Lawd knows how we gwine git dem. She mean, dat sow.” > “We’ll get them all right. You and Prissy can start right now hunting for her.” > Pork was amazed and indignant. > “Miss Scarlett, dat a fe’el han’s bizness. Ah’s allus been a house nigger.” > **[Gone with the Wind](http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks02/0200161h.html)** > > Gone with the Wind, by Margaret Mitchell, free ebook I had no doubt that Maher’s mind went to that movie scene when Sasse invited Maher to Nebraska and said “We’d love to have you work in the fields with us.” Referencing the pop culture is a reliable standby for Maher; I doubt he thought it through at all but just figured people would laugh at the incongruity. So I find it hard to believe, as some are claiming, that Maher was being deliberately provocative, either out of hatefulness or as a means to get himself into the news. The bottom line, of course, is that no one who isn’t black should say that word. Doesn’t matter if the prohibition is reasonable or logical. Just don’t say the word if you’re not black: that’s it, folks. ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [June 12, 2017, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-maher-drops-the-nigger-bomb/787991/265 "2017-06-12T01:28:40Z")
> [@Grrr](#): > > Maybe people don’t give a fuck about “unity”, and it’s all about equality. I think what people most want is respect. ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [June 12, 2017, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-maher-drops-the-nigger-bomb/787991/266 "2017-06-12T16:07:55Z")
> [@Miles\_Standoffish](#): > > I do see your point, but it’s a bit of a false equiv because of the power differential in society. I.e. because Whites enjoy a privileged place in American culture, it’s not offensive to make fun of their culture or speech. I disagree with that premise. It leads to absurdity and is somewhat bigoted. > [@KAndre](#): > > Oddly enough, I actually agree with Ice Cube’s explanation: > > It is very situational. Very. I don’t use the term because I find it vulgar and crass and disgusting (especially when it was aimed at me). I have had friends and relatives use it to emphasize a point and that works for me, and yes, they get to say it because they’re black. As far as I know, my uncle Walter (a Belgium native, and about as white anyone gets, and has been a member of my black family by marriage since 1971) has never used the term while with my family and wouldn’t try; but if he did, he would be shut down immediately, and I would think less of him. And I love my uncle Walter. Random white guys using it, no. Just no. > [@wolfpup](#): > > I’ve defended Bill Maher, and I still defend him, but when someone like Ice Cube proffers a thoughtful explanation for why this was hurtful, it’s not something I feel I can argue with. So I think where we’re left with is this: Maher threw out the phrase in an improvised moment on a live TV show, clearly meaning no harm (we know this from his background of being the furthest thing from a racist, strongly defending black voting rights vs. the “voter ID” crap, etc.), and if there is a broad consensus that it was wrong, so be it; he apologized, and taking all the facts into account, that should be the end of it. I’m genuinely mystified as to why this silly thing continues to have traction and the whining goes on and on. What the hell do they want? The demand that Maher be fired from his Emmy award winning show now in its 15th season is beyond absurd – the equivalent of calling for the death penalty for someone using a bad word. There really is such a thing as balance and perspective, and apparently some folks don’t have it. Ice Cube is a hypocrit. I’ve listened to a bunch of his music and his usage of slurs that come from him being in the higher side of a power differential are very common. He used many homophobic, misogynistic, and racist slurs in his music. For example, The song No Vaseline may hit all of those. He got rich and famous because of his gangster rap and give it s good listen. I have. Maybe he needs to apologize to the official spokespeople of all those groups. ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [June 12, 2017, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-maher-drops-the-nigger-bomb/787991/267 "2017-06-12T16:09:58Z")
> [@Reluctant\_A](#): > > Let me put it this way: I don’t know that Bill Maher is racist, but I don’t know that Bill Maher _isn’t_ racist, either. What I _do_ know, and I’ll go to the bank with this, is that Bill Maher isn’t the “furthest thing” from a racist. I don’t know how anybody can listen to any of his Islamophobic rants and say confidently to themselves, “There ain’t no way in hell _that_ dude is racist!” Like, he might hate all religions, but he doesn’t go in on all religions with the same fervor that he goes in on Islam. That’s coming from someplace other than your run-of-the-mill, garden variety disdain for religion. There’s something else at the root of that kind of mad, and all I’m saying is, I wouldn’t bet _my_ life that it ain’t racism. Each religion is actually a different set of beliefs. It’s not out of the question that some of those sets of beliefs would be judged differently. ---
**Author:** ![wolfpup](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wolfpup/32/10618_2.png) [@wolfpup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wolfpup)\ **Post date:** [June 12, 2017, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-maher-drops-the-nigger-bomb/787991/268 "2017-06-12T16:25:52Z")
> [@octopus](#): > > Ice Cube is a hypocrit. I’ve listened to a bunch of his music and his usage of slurs that come from him being in the higher side of a power differential are very common. He used many homophobic, misogynistic, and racist slurs in his music. For example, The song No Vaseline may hit all of those. He got rich and famous because of his gangster rap and give it s good listen. I have. Maybe he needs to apologize to the official spokespeople of all those groups. Maybe he’s a hypocrite, but hypocrites can still be right about certain issues. I probably should have said Michael Eric Dyson instead of Ice Cube. I mentioned Dyson’s comments in [post #263](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=20269659&postcount=263), which I think were eminently persuasive. Unlike whatever baggage Ice Cube carries, Dyson is an academic intellectual and a sociologist who has a deep understanding of these issues. I still think the whole thing was grossly overblown and I suspect so does Dyson, whose only point was that it was a mistake and Maher shouldn’t have said it, and that should pretty much be the end of it. Those who think Bill Maher is racist just don’t know Maher and they are ignorant and wrong, and those still calling for his head like some rappers and BLM organizers are vengeful morons who are the genuine racists and doing more to inflame racial strife than to calm it. ---
**Author:** ![octopus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/octopus/32/3716_2.png) [@octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/octopus)\ **Post date:** [June 12, 2017, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-maher-drops-the-nigger-bomb/787991/269 "2017-06-12T16:41:16Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > Maybe he’s a hypocrite, but hypocrites can still be right about certain issues. I probably should have said Michael Eric Dyson instead of Ice Cube. I mentioned Dyson’s comments in [post #263](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=20269659&postcount=263), which I think were eminently persuasive. Unlike whatever baggage Ice Cube carries, Dyson is an academic intellectual and a sociologist who has a deep understanding of these issues. I still think the whole thing was grossly overblown and I suspect so does Dyson, whose only point was that it was a mistake and Maher shouldn’t have said it, and that should pretty much be the end of it. Those who think Bill Maher is racist just don’t know Maher and they are ignorant and wrong, and those still calling for his head like some rappers and BLM organizers are vengeful morons who are the genuine racists and doing more to inflame racial strife than to calm it. You are correct. But I’ve also linked to a few black rappers that don’t have a problem with it. Regardless, I don’t think any of that is truly relevant. Either the word is acceptable or not. And judging by music and comedy it seems to be pretty acceptable. ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2017, 2:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-maher-drops-the-nigger-bomb/787991/270 "2017-06-13T02:33:47Z")
> [@wolfpup](#): > > Those who think Bill Maher is racist just don’t know Maher and they are ignorant and wrong, and those still calling for his head like some rappers and BLM organizers are vengeful morons who are the genuine racists and doing more to inflame racial strife than to calm it. Are there still people calling for him to be fired? Even after all that? I don’t miss social media even a tiny bit. ---
**Author:** ![Uzi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/91b2a8/32.png) [@Uzi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uzi)\ **Post date:** [June 13, 2017, 10:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-maher-drops-the-nigger-bomb/787991/271 "2017-06-13T10:00:27Z")
> [@Sherrerd](#): > > I’m pretty sure that the 1939 movie used “house servants” instead of “house n\_\_\_\_” —the construction that appeared in the novel. Again, it’s Scarlett and Pork discussing what could be found to eat: I’ve seen the movie multiple times and read the book, so when I was watching the show I thought the exact same thing that Bill said. I’m more baffled at the wording of the Senator in how he invited Bill to come and work in the fields. It seemed like a planned setup for the joke. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bill-maher-drops-the-nigger-bomb/787991.md?page=13)