I am over 40 years old. At no point in my life has either Bill Maher or Maureen Dowd said anything interesting, thoughtful, useful, or even amusing. They are tipsy country club regulars whose reach should not exceed the room they are in.
I use Maher to illustrate the difference between contrarianism and actual rational skepticism. He's a germ theory denialist and vaccine conspiracy nut because it aligns with his smug self-image as a bold iconoclast speaking truth to power.
Boomers like him because he is nostalgic for a time that never really existed and bases his style on that -- just digs at any way that the culture might change.
That "you all pretty much suck as compared to me, and I'm going to let you know that in the most smarmy condescending way possible" vibe doesn't grab you?
90s Bill had some alt-ideas. 2024 Bill wants to be rid of all those pesky kids (and Muslims and Libs and those cranky Trans). He’s objectively terrible.
Best way I can explain it:
I used to like Maher back when I was green regarding political knowledge. The more I learned about politics, however, the more full of shit I realized Maher actually was.
So I am thinking low information liberals, like I used to be, is who he appeals to.
Hbo once made the mistake of sending me a survey because I'd been watching stuff on Max; and I tore into them about how nobody who's ever watched John Oliver would ever enjoy Bill Fucking Maher. Dude's so out of touch he's like Captain Hook with a smart phone.
I used to enjoy Maher but cannot understand the people still defending Dowd. It was clear during the Bush era that she was a stenographer hack and she’s only gotten worse with time.
Dowd is a one trick pony who's schtick got old a couple of decades ago. Maher is a smug, self satisfied asshole and always has been. Both of them are essentially washed up insult comics.
Nobody with any taste or intellect should pay the slightest attention to them.
Yes. Pointing out that insulting the hijackers as “cowards” was just plain inaccurate was both true and clearly Not Going To Be Well-Received. Last actually surprising thing I can recall him saying.
I genuinely think an underexplored aspect of why things are how they currently are is because the past few years have people, en masse, realize that the public "intellectuals" of the past few decades aren't actually all that smart & those intellectuals can't handle it.
I agree. 44 here. Never have I heard anything useful come out of their mouths. Just utter posh, smug, distain for anyone else not like them. They could retire and rot away and not one person would remind us they gone.
This is the literary equivalent of giving Bill Maher a blowjob while trying to simultaneously trying to shove their whole head up his ass. Physically impossible, and yet....
I occasionally watched politically incorrect years and years ago. There were sometimes good and interesting guests but he always sucked all the air out of the room was the worst part of the show.
Bill Maher was "funny" at one time - but some network bro-CEO green lighted him for a show that I found annoying to watch because of the straw-man argument model.
I think his show was a test lab for how much regular news programming could be bastardized.
Bill Maher has always been that "next on blah blah Bill Maher is mad about 2 things. 1 is normal, this is too draw you in. He will talk about it for 1 minute. The second is INSANE. this is the rest of the show"
