On Friday’s broadcast of HBO’s “Real Time,” host Bill Maher expressed his concern that the “guardians of gotcha” are creating an environment that will “make people afraid to mingle at all, and thrust us back towards a re-segregation of sorts, where instead of just seeing a person, and not a color, now we’re only seeing color.”
Maher said, “Black people have to demand that white people stop culturally appropriating how mad they are about racism. It’s great that Caucasians have finally joined the fight for racial justice in unprecedented numbers, but hating racism the most? You can’t steal that.”
After discussing the incident in Oakland where ropes in trees that were intended for exercise that were put up by a black man were mistaken for nooses and Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf (D) vowed to investigate the ropes as a hate crime, Maher remarked, “Why is this white woman seeing racism where a black man isn’t? The mayor also said, ‘[I]ntentions don’t matter.’ But they do matter. And white people need to stop trying to cancel other white people whose heart is in the right place, but don’t get it exactly right on the first try.”
He later stated, “Liberalism should be about lifting people up, and you don’t do that by slapping down people who are trying to say, I’m on your side. … You want to be a good ally, but not too good, or you’re being a white savior. Use your voice, but don’t make it about yourself, but speak up, unless it’s your time to just listen, and then silence is violence. Even though sometimes silence just means someone works two jobs and has three kids. They have baby food on their shirt, not hate in their heart.”
He concluded, “I worry that the kind of tension that the guardians of gotcha are creating is going to make people afraid to mingle at all, and thrust us back towards a re-segregation of sorts, where instead of just seeing a person, and not a color, now we’re only seeing color. Maybe this is old school liberalism talking, but I don’t think that’s the way to go.”
Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett
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