When did Columbia become Kanye State? Bill Maher asked that question on Friday Real time on HBO, setting the tone for a show that focused on the nationwide campus unrest and what lies behind it.
Maher tried to answer this himself in his New Rules editorial, saying, “No one likes you,” in a message to protesters blocking traffic in the name of a cause.
He claimed that protesters do not realize that they are not swaying people to their point of view by making them late to work or picking up a child from daycare.
“You can stick your hands to the street because your hands don’t have to do any work today,” Maher said, claiming that for many social justice warriors “it’s more about the fight than the cause.”
Given the current wave of pro-Palestinian protests, he suggested that those who care should start repressing women in many countries and show a woman in a burqa. He also mentioned the famine in North Korea, the detentions in China and the Burundi anti-gay jihad.
“Are you really speaking truth to power, or do you think you look cool in a keffiyeh?”
Maher said activists should ask themselves if the most important thing in my life is something I didn’t hear about six months ago.”
In his one-on-one interview, Maher introduced Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is running as an independent candidate for president.
Maher questioned RFK on several topics, particularly his controversial stance on vaccinations. Although they agreed on some points, Maher kept him updated several times with questions based on previous quotes from RFK.
Although seen by many as an election spoiler, RFK has tried to post poll numbers that give him strong support in battleground states, among younger people and among independent voters.
RFK argued against the government’s attempts to stifle free speech because he said doing so would encourage large pharmacies and other companies to also suppress unpopular topics.
“As soon as we say this is OK, we let the genie out of the bottle,” he said.
Maher asked him about his statement that no vaccine is safe and effective. RFK claimed the question was asked on a radio show and he was interrupted before he finished his answer. He said live vaccines appear to work and that double-blind testing is needed to determine the effectiveness of other vaccines.
The panel included Scott Galloway, professor of marketing at NYU Stern School of Business, and Don Lemon, former CNN anchor and current host of the podcast The Don Lemon Show.
Their discussion focused primarily on the protests on campus and the difference between activists today and those of yesteryear.
Lemon said the difference was the “horrible anti-Semitism” and that most protesters didn’t have the information they needed because they got their news from TikTok. “You should give children a wide berth, but when there is violence and anti-Semitism, that is wrong,” he said.
Galloway agreed and also blamed certain teachers for exacerbating the situation.