You know what? I’ll bite. Writers are owed a living as writers. If you have a job, whether it’s CEO at a Fortune 500 company or second assistant jizz-mopper at a porno theater, and you do it well, then you should be entitled to be able to live off the fruits of your labor. To say otherwise is to declare that some people shouldn’t be able to afford to live.
The problem is that this apparently empathetic position leads to some absurd conclusions. I’ll stress here that there’s an important nuance in what Maher was saying; it’s not that working writers shouldn’t be entitled to a decent living wage, it’s that not everyone is entitled and qualified to be a writer. This is especially true in creative endeavors for which some people have natural talents and others are useless.
If one accepts your flawed premise, then it logically follows that a terrible scriptwriter is entitled to be well paid for scripts that no one wants, a terrible novelist is entitled to make a living writing terrible novels, and the clichéd “starving artist” is entitled to make a decent living even if he can’t paint or draw. Who is supposed to pay these people, and for what? It’s an absurd premise.
But sure, writers who are good at what they do and have their scripts accepted by studios are entitled to be well paid and to not get screwed by the studios.
At the risk of going off-topic, I can think of a couple billionaires who aren’t being taxed properly.
Really?
I’d like to be a professional footballer, Am I owed a living in that particular career?
That depends. Are you good at hitting football? If yes, then you should be able to make a living doing that. If you’re not, then whatever you are good at, you should be able to make a living off of. Noone should be unable to make a living at a job they’re competent at.
You will note that it is not AMPTP’s claim that the writers are bad at their jobs.
…I asked ChatGPT on your behalf to provide you with a list:
I agree, and I’m sure Bill Maher does, too. That’s not what his comment meant, at all. You’ve moved the goalposts here.
My comments stem for what I think is a reasonable interpretation of what Maher meant. If you think he meant something different, then my comments don’t apply, but if he did mean that writers don’t deserve a living wage, then it’s Maher who was being absurd. As someone who himself employs writers I very much doubt he would make such a hostile and unreasonable statement about his own staff.
I’ll repeat what I said:
writers who are good at what they do and have their scripts accepted by studios are entitled to be well paid and to not get screwed by the studios.
There is ample evidence that the AMPTP has been using various tactics to screw the writers, underpay them, and make the terms of their employment less favourable. In all those respects, I’m totally with the WGA.
You give him a lot more credit than I do. As far as I’m concerned, he’s a cranky old shithead who’s mad at the world because it isn’t the 90s anymore and the world has changed but he hasn’t, and he’d rather blame millennials and “wokeness” for the world’s problems (and the fact that he can’t use casual racism and homophobia for cheap laughs anymore) than actually consider that maybe he’s out of touch. From most accounts he’s awful to his staff, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he endorses DeSantis by the end of the year.
You’re evading the issue. Either I’m making the correct reasonable interpretation of what Bill Maher meant, or he was blatantly insulting his own writers. You can believe whichever version you like.
“Seriously?” 
But if you look at all those points, most of them are just more detailed expositions of the specific strategies that companies employ to increase profits. Shareholder value ultimately derives from the balance sheet. The points that aren’t directly about profits are concerned with things like customer relations that don’t generally apply to movie studios.
Here’s the #1 takeaway about shareholder value from Investopedia:
Shareholder value is the value given to stockholders in a company based on the firm’s ability to sustain and grow profits over time.
Maher blatantly insults pretty.much everyone he considers to be his Lesser. You think his writers are an exception?
This is getting way off topic, and it also isn’t true. Maher insults people he doesn’t like. You think he hates his own writers?
He had to be publicly shamed out of firing them all, didn’t he?
No, he didn’t. When did Maher ever threaten to fire his writers?
I assume you’re once again misrepresenting facts, and are probably referring to Maher’s aborted attempt to bring back his show despite the strike, which would naturally have been without writers since there was, you know, a writers strike.
Incidentally, I also have an issue with the way you misrepresented Maher canceling the proposed comeback: “Translation: Drew chickened out and now I don’t have anyone to blame my assholishness on”.
Is it possible that Maher caved to pressure from union supporters? Sure, it’s possible, but Maher has rarely shied away from controversy. If one reviews the sequence of events, Maher announced on September 13 that the show was coming back in a couple of weeks, but without writers, because nearly five months was just too long for the rest of his crew to be out of work. Last Monday September 18 the WGA said they were returning to the negotiating table, and the AMPTP confirmed. Maher immediately canceled the show’s planned return, explaining that the return to negotiations made him hopeful that the strike could be resolved and the show could come back with writers on board. Also, I highly doubt Maher gives a flying fig what Drew Barrymore does. And if he did get union pressure, I doubt he burst into tears over it like Drew did.
What went on behind the scenes we have no idea, but I can’t help but notice the tendency of many here to put the worst, most cynical interpretations on the motivations behind actions they happen to dislike.
It’s probably because people here think Bill Maher is an asshole. (And therefore, he did it because he’s an asshole.)
And were deeply disappointed with Drew Barrymore.
I like Maher as a performer, and most of his interviews and panel discussions really are in-depth and informative, though occasionally some of his personal nuttery comes out (like “medical science doesn’t know anything, so think for yourself”). I obviously don’t know him personally, but he seemed fun and congenial on Jerry Seinfeld’s episode with him on Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee. But I rather suspect that both were performing for the cameras, and I’ve long harbored the suspicion that Maher and Seinfeld are actually both assholes IRL!
…I asked chatGPT to tell me about getting up in the morning.
Gosh! It sounds like a production line!
LOL. Yes. You said: “I look back at some of the great TV produced and see no correlation between a mandated minimum numbers of writers and how good or popular something is.” I’ll ask you the question again: when you looked back, what shows were you thinking about that had mandated minimum number of writers?
You didn’t say “to the best of my knowledge, it was never a thing.” I quoted what you said. I stand by my response.
But the studios aren’t hiring the extra resources!
That’s the entire point!
For decades, writers rooms were staffed in the same way. Then the studios started to slash the numbers in the room. This impacted both the writing process and the writers in a number of different ways that I’ve patiently explained to you over and over again. The WGA thinks that the way to address this is to mandate the process that used to be standard-operating-procedure. So the minimums are on the table. They are up for negotiation. Its now in the AMPTP’s court.
Well you do if the studios aren’t giving you enough staff in order to be able to do the job.
:: surprised face ::
This isn’t an argument against anything I said. The WGA are well aware of the existence of this thing called a “deadline.” It’s a basic part of doing the job. Its the showrunners responsibility to manage the room, to prevent their writers from being exploited or being overworked.
And that starts with having enough writers in the room to cope with the workload. You can’t do the job if you don’t have the staff.
What guidelines do you suggest? And why wouldn’t you both have these guidelines and have mandatory minimum staffing? Because, as I’ve told you over and over and over again, there are multiple reasons why minimums are on the table. Addressing just one of those reasons doesn’t mean the others top magically existing.
That does sound like an android trying very hard, and very badly, to pretend that it’s human.
…I implement the Oral Hygiene Protocol at least twice a day. Now I’m planning on engaging my Lunch Subroutines before my Final Check and Exit. I am a human. I promise.
Very good, Senator Cruz. Would you like your tungsten supplements now or after your bowl of live cockroaches?