Bill Maher attacking woke overreach has become a “dog bites man” headline.
The “Real Time with Bill Maher” host regularly skewers Identity Politics, free speech suppression and other hallmarks of the new, intolerant Left.
That means Friday’s Maher broadside packed little news value, at least on the surface.
Maher pushed further, though, connecting woke with a similar movement that too few people summon when the subject comes up.
Chairman Mao’s cultural revolution.
“If you’re part of today’s woke revolution you need to study the part of revolutions where they spin out of control because the revolutionaries get so drunk on their own purifying elixir they imagine they can reinvent the very nature of human beings,” Maher said, a line not meant for laughter.
The screen featured images of Chairman Mao and Vladimir Lenin, surrounded by crowds and chaos. Maher proceeds to smash both socialism and communism, two sacred cows of the far Left.
The comic quipped that he asked Chat GPT, the rising A.I. interface, what the similarities are between the woke revolution and Chairman Mao’s 1960s version.
“It wrote back, ‘how long do you have?”
“A lot of pointing and shaming went on, and, oh, about a million dead,” Maher said of the nightmarish Chinese revolution. “And the only way to survive was to plead insanity for the crime of being insufficiently radical and then apologize and thank the state for the chance to see what a piece of s*** you are and, of course, submit to re-education, or as we call it in America, freshman orientation.”
Huge audience laughter erupts.
Think he’s wrong?
Here’s how Scarlett Johansson, arguably the most beautiful, bankable star in Hollywood, reacted when woke revolutionaries demanded she not play a trans character in a film.
I was not sensitive, my initial reaction to it…I wasn’t totally aware of how the trans community felt about those three actors playing — and how they felt in general about cis actors playing — transgender people … I wasn’t aware of that conversation — I was uneducated … So I learned a lot through that process. I misjudged that… It was a hard time. It was like a whirlwind. I felt terribly about it. To feel like you’re kind of tone-deaf to something is not a good feeling.”
Here’s Halle Berry’s public apology for the same crime.
“As a cisgender woman, I now understand that I should not have considered this role, and that the transgender community should undeniably have the opportunity to tell their own stories,” she wrote. “I am grateful for the guidance and critical conversation over the past few days and will continue to listen, educate and learn from this mistake. I vow to be an ally in using my voice to promote better representation on-screen, both in front of and behind the camera.”
Nothing similar about the two revolutions. Not at all.
It’s important to note the mainstream media quietly approve of these forced confessions. Reporters routinely seek out stars who share “problematic” thoughts, eager to get their statements on the matter.
Said statements often come in the form of hostage-style apologies.
Maher’s monologue brought up a prime example, a liberal professor who underwent an Americanized “struggle session” for daring to inform his students.
…Jason Kilborn, a law professor at the University of Illinois Chicago, who was suspended and forced to undergo diversity training after using redacted racist and sexist slurs in a test question about a hypothetical instance of discrimination in the workplace has filed a First Amendment suit against his employer.
If you can’t see the similarities between the Mao revolution and the professor’s plight, Maher said, it means “the person who needs reeducation is you.”
RELATED: WHY HASN’T THE LEFT CANCELED BILL MAHER?
Why was Maher’s stance so bold, so brave? We’ve watched the Left and media outlets alike deem China off-limits for cultural criticism. Hollywood certainly won’t say a syllable about China’s authoritarian streak, its inhumane treatment of Uyghur Muslims or its fanatical free speech suppression.
Disney, Inc. sent the nation a rhetorical bouquet when “Mulan” hit streaming services.
China likely unleashed a devastating pandemic on the globe in 2020, but those who suggested as much were canceled, attacked and dubbed racist to the core.
The chief “racist?” President Donald Trump.
Even today, it’s frowned upon to suggest the Wuhan lab sprang COVID-19 upon us.
Not only did Maher directly summon China’s gruesome past actions, he directly tied the woke movement to the authoritarian Left.
It’s the boldest move of his considerable career, and most mainstream media outlets ignored it, of course.
Deadline.com, a far-Left entertainment site, proved the exception. Its coverage lacked the tsk-tsking some might have expected. The reporter treated the comments respectfully with no editorial sniping.
The rest of the press stood down. They remain in the pocket of the woke revolution, but as the aforementioned professor learned, being on the left doesn’t protect you from today’s revolutionaries.
You can’t say Maher hasn’t warned us.
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