Bill Maher Tries to Explain Free Speech to His Audience: It Includes That Which You Hate

Respectfully, I’m generally not a tremendous fan of Bill Maher’s perspective. He once compared parenting a mentally disabled child to owning a dog.

Also, for the record:

Alex Jones, who was recently banned from social media (please read my article about that), has not lost his rights. “Free speech” doesn’t mean you have the right to say what you want on a company’s social media platform. If Facebook, for example, were to decide it was a Mormon enterprise, it would have every right to only allow content that was pro-Mormon. Therefore, Alex hasn’t been wronged.

However, I believe it’s telling when we’re looking to Bill Maher to stand up for the concept of free speech — a past tenet of liberalism.

Liberalism is dying, and leftism is occupying its shell. The Democratic Party looks to be taken over by the zombified remains of a once-pro-liberty faction. One that spearheaded the free speech movement at Berkley, before it rose to crush it with equal zeal.

So anyway, here we go:

Maher began the show by stressing that Alex Jones is a liar and no friend of his. However, he said, he disagreed with Jones’s removal from multiple social media sites (again, please read here). Bill explained what, terrifyingly, current left-wing college students and social justice warriors clearly fail to understand about our country and its most important principle of freedom:

“If you’re a liberal, you’re supposed to be for free speech. That’s free speech for the speech you hate. That’s what free speech means. We’re losing the thread of the concepts that are important to this country. If you care about the real American sh*t or you don’t. And if you do, it goes for every side. I don’t like Alex Jones, but Alex Jones gets to speak. Everybody gets to speak.”

It’s beyond disturbing that, in America, this even needs to be said. But sadly, it does.

And I, for one — despite my frequent lack of appreciation for Bill Maher — am grateful to him for saying it.

[Note: in the video, as Bill introduces the fact that Alex (who has a REALLY cool name) has been kicked off platforms, the crowd goes nuts with applause. Clearly, they don’t yet realize his point is that Jones shouldn’t have been banned. Once Maher explains, the crowd goes nuts again. I’ve observed this phenomenon before on his show — the audience seems ready to agree with whatever they assume Bill thinks, before they’re even sure what that is. You could say I was hearing half the crowd each time, but I don’t believe that’s the case. They appear to be following the perceived piper instead of the tune. Just a personal observation; have you ever thought the same?]

Thank you for reading! What are your thoughts on Bill and his defense of free speech? Does he still wield power? Are social justice warriors within his reach? Or has his relevance substantially faded? Please let us know in the Comments section below.

Check my other Alex Jones article, plus maybe my coverage of California and due process, Dennis Rodman winning me over, and what diversity really looks like.

Find all my RedState work here.

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