The University of California, Berkeley, is supposed to be the epitome of liberalism. The campus was the forefront of the counterculture movement in the 1960s, including protests and riots over civil rights, the Free Speech Movement, and the Vietnam war.
Today, though, students at Berkeley are circulating a petition to have Bill Maher canceled as their fall commencement speaker, desipite his being one of the handful of few liberals willing to show up at a Right-wing knife fight with a loaded weapon. Bill Maher is the type of progressive that might actually save the liberal movement in America and the irony that a handful of birkenstock liberals might cancel his appearance as a commencement speaker borders on batshit crazy.
Maher regularly takes up the liberal cause and fights to forward liberal policies, even when they are uncomfortable. Especially when they are uncomfortable. Not the least of which was his recent controversial statements regarding the violent nature of Islam. On his show “Real Time,” Maher was accused of racism by none other than the next Batman, Ben Affleck.
“Islam is the only religion that acts like the mafia that will f***ing kill you if you say the wrong thing,” Maher said.
That was too controversial for the birkenstock liberals at UC Berkeley.
“To count yourself as a liberal,” Maher has said, “you have to stand up for liberal principles.” Those principles don’t stop when they may be deemed unpopular.
In fact, the data supports Maher’s claim that Islam has a problem with violence, especially against women. Numerous studies have found that honor killings are considered acceptable by a shockingly high number of Muslims in Middle Eastern and South Asian countries. Afghanistan shows support for stonings rising as high as 80 percent.
It doesn’t take an overabundance of analysis to believe that just maybe Bill Maher was absolutely correct in promoting an arms-length discussion about the topic. It certainly must make us all wonder whether UC Berkeley has forgotten that vigorous debate is the beginning of change. But let’s not overanalyze the quick fix, that Bill Maher should tell the pinheads at UC Berkeley to kiss his wonderfully-liberalized and outspoken ass.
