Earlier today, I shared a video clip from Bill Maher's Real Time show.
Well, here is another one.
This one is about Whoopi Goldberg, who recently was given a leave of absence (imposed on her) for saying something controversial. Namely, that the Holocaust and the killing of Jews was not about race.
Like most people, I find what Goldberg said abhorrent, not to mention completely devoid of any factual basis. You do not have to be an expert on Hitler or Nazi Germany to know that race was a key issue with the Nazis, and that they imposed a racial code, and passed a ton of racial laws, in pursuit of the realization of their ideal of greater racial purity in Germany, and indeed in Europe. It was not some minor idea that they put on the back burner, but was front and center. It was the reason that there was such a thing as a Holocaust, which was a bureaucratically run system of mass murder unlike anything that the world had seen before, or seen since. How Goldberg could have missed that particular point is, in fact, quite beyond me, frankly.
That said, wrong or right, agree or disagree, she should have the right to express those views. Especially, as Maher correctly points out, on a show that calls itself "The View." To be kicked off, even if it winds up being temporary, for expressing unpopular opinion seems to be against free speech in a country that goes overboard for patting itself on a the back for how great and wonderful all of our alleged freedoms here are. She did not yell fire in a crowded theater, or even express hate speech. She simply expressed her position that, in her view, the Holocaust was not about race.
Again, while I believe she was dead wrong, the issue is not whether I or others agree with her or not. The question here is whether or not she should be allowed to express those views. And once again, I agree with Maher that she should indeed be able to do so, and that putting her in a timeout, like she is some sort of child that needs to sit in the corner and think about what she has said and done, is patronizing and an insult.
Do you agree? Feel free to express yourself here. I welcome a debate.
I agree with you. While what she said was misguided and tone deaf to put it mildly, that doesn't make her a proponent of hate speech. And I too am getting more than a little tired of the "You have the right to free speech, *BUT*..." crowd.
ReplyDeleteI'm not suggesting that there isn't an important distinction to be made between freedom of speech versus freedom from judgment and consequences. (Sometimes, people respond to the pushback they receive after saying something stupid by pointing out that they have the right to free speech, when that's not in dispute.) But this isn't merely pushback. It comes perilously close to being de facto censorship, which to me is far more dangerous and alarming than anyone's offensive views in the greater scheme of things.
Bill Maher experienced something similar roughly 20 years ago, when ABC canceled his show "Politically Incorrect" after he refused to walk in lockstep with what Dubya and the mainstream media were telling us to think about that administration, the war in Iraq, and terrorists. As I recall, what really landed him in hot water was refuting Dubya's characterization of terrorists who are willing to sacrifice their own lives for their ideology as "cowards". Mind you, he obviously wasn't condoning or defending terrorism – merely acknowledging that a willingness to die for a cause, however twisted and delusional that cause may be, is not an act of cowardice. But since Dubya was considered untouchable in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 – which was what passed for "patriotism" at the time – any attempt at nuanced, dispassionate analysis or healthy debate was not only widely frowned upon, but actively repressed.
For me, it always comes back to that line from "Know Your Rights" by The Clash: "You have the right to free speech, as long as you're not dumb enough to actually try it.". Sadly, nothing's changed in the forty years since that song was released.
No arguments from my end.
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