Bill Maher lashes out at 'privilege-y' anti-Israel protesters who are 'cosplaying as revolutionaries' on college campuses
He said the Palestinian keffiyeh headscarf is today's equivalent of the Che Guevara T-shirt and asks why the ignorant publicity-seeking protesters are not targeting truly repressive regimes
By Dominic Yeatman
Daily Mail
Apr 28, 2024
Bill Maher tore into college age protesters as performative publicity seekers, warning that 'no-one likes you', in a withering putdown on his HBO show
Bill Maher tore into college-age protesters as performative publicity seekers, warning that 'no-one likes you', in a withering putdown on his HBO show.
The comic and pundit blasted demonstrators, who have brought chaos to 'normies' with sit-down protests on major roads and college campuses, as damaging their own cause.
He dubbed the Palestinian keffiyeh headscarf the modern equivalent of the Che Guevara T-shirt and scorned their 'cosplay as revolutionaries' while disrupting the lives of those who have to work for a living.
'Hey, if it makes you feel good to cosplay as revolutionaries. Knock yourself out. Burn yourself out. Just don't drag Gaza into it,' he said on Real Time with Bill Maher.
'Also, throwing stuff on paintings is just stupid. No one sees mashed potatoes on a Monet and thinks he's got a point, I should recycle my cans.'
Demonstrators have repeatedly targeted major bridges and highways bringing chaos to city centers since the protests erupted
Maher joked that the Palestinian keffiyeh headscarf, seen here on students at UCLA is today's equivalent of the Che Guevara T-shirt
The 68-year-old had already clashed with guest Don Lemon who was appearing alongside NYU professor Scott Galloway, after the former CNN host complained of living 'in uncomfortable spaces all the time'.
'What do you mean uncomfortable spaces?' Maher demanded.
Lemon replied: 'I am often the only person of color in the room.'
'There's only three of us,' Maher pointed out.
The exchange prompted a clapback from Caitlyn Jenner who tweeted: 'Good on you Bill Maher.
'Don is a privileged, wealthy, (not to mention entitled ie Demands to X and CNN in alleged contract terms), celebrity. Get over yourself.'
But Maher saved his most scathing remarks for those protesting Israel's war in Gaza, denouncing them as ignorant and misguided - dubbing New York's Columbia State University 'Kanye State'.
'You know Passover?' he asked. 'It celebrates the Exodus of the Jews in Biblical times from Egypt. And nowadays it celebrates the Exodus of the Jews from Columbia University.
'I'm not saying there aren't sincere passions about Gaza, especially among people from the region, but Social Justice Warriors, for a lot of them, it seems like it's more about the warrior-ing than about whatever the cause is.
Lectures are heading back online at Columbia University in New York after protesters seized the college grounds
Columbia is among dozens of colleges that have become swept up in Israel-Hamas protests, with other prestigious universities including Harvard and MIT thrown into chaos
There were more road protests in DC on Saturday night ahead of the White House Correspondents' Association dinner
'If you really cared about apartheid so much — which Israel does not actually practice.
'Arabs there vote, they serve in Parliament, they sit on the judiciary — wouldn't you start with this? With the hundreds of millions of women in the world who live under a true apartheid, a gender apartheid of the most brutal kind? I'll wait.
'Are you really speaking truth to power, or do you just think you look cool in a keffiyeh, which is really just the new Che Guevara t-shirt.
Che Guevara t-shirts were popular during the Vietnam War protests
'Another historical figure you never researched and still think is a hero, but was actually a sadistic racist monster fighting for communism, the worst form of government ever. But these are small matters.
'Small matters, when activism merges with narcissism.
'Less about the cause and more about me, look at me, watch me! And if you like the way I'm fighting injustice, remember to like and subscribe!'
Among those joining the ranks of unemployed protesters are the 28 Google employees who were fired earlier this month for joining a protest at the company's offices in New York and California.
'Maybe if these Google employees had the slightest idea what kind of fundamentalist, oppressive assholes they're supporting — Hamas, the Houthis, Hezbollah, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard — they might take it a little easier on the world's greatest monster, Genocide Joe,' he said.
'Genocide, by the way, is when you want to wipe out an entire people. That's the stated goal of Hamas. That's what From the River to the Sea means. Hamas would do that to Israel, but can't. Israel could do that to them, but doesn't.
'You know how you can find that out? Google it!'
And he mocked US airman Aaron Bushnell, 25, who burnt himself to death outside the Israeli embassy in DC in February in protest at US involvement in the country's assault on Gaza.
'In his last Facebook post he said, 'many of us like to ask ourselves, what would I do if I was alive during slavery?' Maher remarked.
'Interesting cocktail question, sir. And I guess the right answer is kill myself.
'But it wouldn't have actually fix the problem if General Ulysses S Grant had immolated himself and his last words were, 'Hey, Lincoln, are you using that log?
'And then last week, another sad, confused man set himself on fire at the Trump trial in New York.
'So, you can tell yourself you're a martyr for the Palestinian cause, but it's a lot less special when the next guy does it for Stormy Daniels.'
He demanded to know why protesters were not targeting repressive regimes including China, North Korea and Myanmar, rather than America's ally in the Middle East.
And he warned that protesters would never win allies among the American public by disrupting their lives.
'Someone needs to tell the people who block traffic in the name of a cause, no one likes you. And you're probably hurting your cause,' he insisted.
'In case you haven't seen what's going on lately, activist for ending the war in Gaza have taken to gathering on roads and bridges and stopping commuters from crossing.
'It happened last week in New York and San Francisco. Chicago, Seattle. They also blocked traffic here on the 405, but no one noticed.
Police attempts to remove and arrest demonstrators as here at Northeastern University have been thwarted with the return of protestors to cleared spaces
Emory University economics professor Caroline Fohlin was among those seized by police
'What they did notice was this: That you have to be pretty dumb to think that the way to bring people around to your point of view is to make them late to pick up their kids from daycare.
'And that's what most normies are thinking. I have a kid, I have a job. And yes, I'm sure there are injustices on both sides in the Middle East as there are injustices all over the world, but I'm going to be late for work.
'Something you protesters on the bridge seem to have the luxury of not having to worry about, which seems kind of privilege-y.
'You can glue your hands to the street because your hands don't have to do any work today.'
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