Maher Clashes with Panel on Islamic Terrorism: ‘Are There Christian Terrorist Armies?’

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http://www.mediaite.com/online/maher-clashes-with-panel-on-islamic-terrorism-are-there-christian-terrorist-armies/

 

 

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Discussing the London terrorist attack, Bill Maher and his panel tonight ended up clashing in their views of Islamic terrorism with Maher’s asserting that people can’t say it has “nothing to do with Islam.”

Louise Mensch and Chris Hayes immediately objected, and Mensch said that Timothy McVeigh “had nothing to do with Roman Catholicism.”

“Every time some bomb goes off, before it goes off,” Maher said, “somebody yells ‘Allahu Akbar.’ I never hear anybody go ‘Merry Christmas. This one’s for the flying nun.'”

He said there aren’t “Christian terrorist armies like ISIS” going around.

Hayes brought up the IRA, but Maher shot back, “That’s the past! But we’re living now!… Let’s not **** around with this anymore, can we get real?”

 

 

 

[homersapien 11,396]

Islam has a major problem with extremist sects.  Our challenge regarding Islam as a whole is to help the moderate/liberal Muslims in opposing extremism.  

Trying to portray Islam - as a belief system - as being inherently conducive to extremism doesn't help, even if partially true.  

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At some point censoring things to pacify a possible retaliation is indeed a response that affects all Muslims.

For example CNN chose not to show the Charlie Hebdo cartoon. It wasn't censored because they were worried about all Muslims They were worried about some Muslims.

Comedy Central censored South Park because of a depiction of Mohammed. 

Pam Gellar had a "Draw Mohammed" event and people tried to show up to kill the participants. 

Salman Rushdie had a fatwa placed on him for writing a book.

A burning of a Qua ran in Florida caused violent protests in other countries.

A youtube video caused violent protest.

 

Nobody died when the Book of Mormon play went to Broadway.

Nobody died when South Park used Jesus in some of their episodes.

Piss Christ didn't result in a fatwa placed on the artist.

People like Sam Harris get called a bigot on CNN, while trying to have a discussion.

 

 

Bill Maher called an Islamophobe by a professor:

 

 

 

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http://www.salon.com/2017/03/26/bill-maher-makes-us-dumber-how-ignorance-fear-and-stupid-pop-culture-cliches-shape-americans-view-of-the-middle-east/

 

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Bill Maher makes us dumber: How ignorance, fear and stupid pop-culture clichés shape Americans’ view of the Middle East

 

e emerging alt-right may have been responsible for propagating Islamophobia, liberal punditry and pop culture also gave it wider currency.

Consider, for example, comedian and TV host Bill Maher. His Islamophobia is well-known. There are endless examples to pick from when it comes to Maher’s anti-Muslim sentiments, but he outdid himself in an October 2010 episode of “Real Time with Bill Maher,” his talk show on HBO. Maher confessed that he was afraid that so many babies with the name Muhammad were being born in Western countries. Addressing his panel, Maher asked, “Am I a racist to feel alarmed by that? Because I am. And it’s not because of the race; it’s because of the religion. I don’t have to apologize, do I, for not wanting the Western world to be taken over by Islam in 300 years?”

His panel was unimpressed. Reihan Salam — who is now the executive editor of the National Review — rejected Maher’s bigotry, offering that he “has some uncles named Muhammad” who are “pretty decent guys.” It was a clever and subtle takedown. Salam was not alone, however. Separately, Fareed Zakaria and Ben Affleck have very publicly taken Maher to task for his Islamophobia, but he remains unchastened. If anything, it seems that that the election of Donald Trump has fueled Maher’s obsessive concern about the “threat” of Islam, which influences his left-leaning audience, no matter how much distaste they feel for the president.

 

 

In retrospect, Maher’s bigoted statement is all the more striking because it foreshadowed recent comments by Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, who declared that Western civilization cannot be saved by “other people’s babies.” Both Maher on the left and King — who is a white nationalist — on the right share a creepy obsession with birth rates and what alt-right racists sometimes describe as “white genocide.” It is not hard to imagine that Maher, whose show is watched by almost 2 million people weekly, aligning with King when it comes to banning Muslims from the United States.

Maher is not an outlier, however, as the author Jack Shaheen meticulously documented in a number of works, including his 2001 book “Reel Bad Arabs” and “Guilty: Hollywood’s Verdict on Arabs After 9/11,” published in 2008. It has only become worse since then, with television shows like “24″ and “Homeland.” There is so much wrong with “Homeland” that it is hard to know where to start, but the popular Showtime series, whose producers brand it as a sophisticated thriller, makes basic mistakes about Islam and Muslims. The terrorists depicted in “Homeland” are not the ranting and raving lunatics of the Libyans in “Back to the Future” but rather are a nod to the current Zeitgeist’s popular conception of Osama bin Laden: coolheaded masterminds with an oversupply of cunning and slickness. There are few, if any, representations of Muslims in the media that do not conjure images of violence and hostility to the West.

 

 

 

Then there are memoirs like “Not Without My Daughter,” which was adapted into a 1991 movie of the same name starring Sally Field. It chronicles Betty Mahmoody’s story of marrying a vindictive and abusive Iranian man who kidnapped her daughter, inside Tehran. Mahmoody’s story was frightening, but there are plenty of cruel or crazy husbands who happen to be Christians or Jews.  Why not movies about them? This is not to suggest that Hollywood consciously sets out to besmirch Islam, but rather that films like “Not Without My Daughter”reflect a popular Zeitgeist that the movie reinforces.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a Somali-born Dutch-American critic of Islam, has garnered significant acclaim in the United States with her own firsthand accounts of violence that Muslim men have inflicted upon her. Hers is a heartbreaking and important story about the abuse of women that some people have sought to justify through religion. But what makes Ali’s work problematic is the fact that it has been taken by many individuals, including Maher, as a thorough representation of Islam and the Muslim world. It is no wonder, then, that the bizarre notion that Islam is a political ideology rather than a religion has gained traction in the United States.

For all the political, diplomatic and military ties between the United States and countries in the Middle East, in addition to the hundreds of thousands of U.S. citizens who have lived, worked and studied in the region over many years, Americans continue to allow fear to shape their views of the Middle East and Islam. How could a region with more than 300 million people be reduced to simplistic notions about alleged affinities to authoritarianism, violence and misogyny? It seems absurd to offer generalizations about a region so rich in different cultures, histories, politics and, yes, religious practices. The United States will never get beyond its tragic encounter with the Middle East so long as people like Bill Maher play an important role in framing the terms of debate.

Steven A. Cook is the Eni Enrico Mattei Senior Fellow for Middle East and Africa Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. His new book, "False Dawn: Protest, Democracy, and Violence in the New Middle East," will be published by Oxford University Press in June