S19.E27: Anne Applebaum; Gillian Tett; Dan Savage

[PrincessPurrsALot]

Quote

Journalist Anne Applebaum is the interview guest.  The panelists are journalist Gillian Tett and columnist Dan Savage. 

Original air date 2021.09.17

[sugarbaker design]

Thank god for Dan Savage.

[bobbyjoe]

Oh, what a big surprise that it’s AOC’s tweet about trans people that got Bill particularly riled up.  Bill was like “help us along, explain,” and “I’m a fairly well-informed person but I’m just learning about it” about the trans issues she (briefly) raised in a tweet that was actually about abortion rights.

Ya know, Bill, you have, wait let me check my notes, oh yeah, your own tv show and, oh what was it, I think, your own staff.  

So, maybe if it wasn’t statistically more likely that your audience members would be struck by lightning at the very exact same time they were winning the lottery than that they might ever see an actual transgender person on your show, then maybe, you know, you might have already learned something by— now think about this, Bill, it’s gonna blow your mind— actually talking to a member of the minority you use as a cheap punching bag nearly every week.

ETA: Also, Bill is pretty much verbatim repeating the New York Post on the Met Gala, but like a lot of what he does he’s leaving out important facts.   Guests at the Met Gala were required to wear masks when indoors at the event— you can see pictures of them in the masks all over the internet if you do even the most basic research.  They didn’t wear the masks when doing their entrance photoshoots in the designated area.  That’s pretty much standard practice at all celebrity award shows and events in recent months— take a look at the red carpets this year for the Grammys, MTV Music Awards, etc. (again, Maher and his staff could have Googled this)— so trying to pin it on the Met Gala as some horrifying class discrepancy is deceptive.  They were also required to be vaccinated.  

So despite the concern trolling by Bill and the panel it’s not so good a story if Maher let you know that they only had the masks off briefly to get their fashion photos taken in an assigned area— and they’re clearly socially distanced except for the people they came with in most of those photos— but otherwise both guests and staff were required to be masked.

Edited September 18, 2021 by bobbyjoe

[Mr. R0b0t]

The closing rant was a microcosm of Bill's slide into old-man-yelling-at-cloud-ism.  Mike Richards was an absolute snake of a guy and the podcasts were the tip of the iceberg.  Won't someone on his staff point this out to him???  I actually enjoyed the panel (although if I ever hear the word tribalism again it will be too soon).  Dan Savage up there giving lessons to Bill was both awesome and terrible in that if Dan hadn't been there to give it would Bill still be confused or flat out bitching and complaining about AOC with no damn idea what he's talking about? Likely.  Does Bill know how to use google?  

Despite it all I still love the show, but more and more it's due to the guests and the format.  I hope when Bill hangs it up that someone else can do a show like this one and it's on HBO so that it can remain unfiltered.  

[letter8358]

Does Bill think the rich pay more taxes or maybe AOC's dress hit a nerve to him? I say the latter.

[iMonrey]

Quote

Thank god for Dan Savage.

Really, the only reason I keep watching this shit show - guests like this. Actually, the first half hour wasn't bad, and then of course it took the usual nose dive. I didn't know where the hell Bill was going with that whole "rich people pay taxes too" thing, and the transgender/AOC discussion just went right over my head. Then, of course, the final new rule devolved into - what else? - Cancel Culture. Because, of course. 

I swear, sometimes I think Bill watches Tucker Carlson right before the show starts and then starts bitching about liberals because of something he heard on that show.

I've said this before, I'm sure, but it really speaks to how privileged Bill is that he thinks cancel culture and wokeness are the two biggest problems in the world. 

[DoctorAtomic]

I didn't get the tax the rich argument either. Bill was incorrect - Bezos personally pays less than lots of middle income people, not just Amazon. 

And so what if those 65,000 people pay half in New York? Are they paying what they owe though? I mean, I actually paid taxes last year too. So what? 

I liked the interview. If you're going to rant about cancel culture, get someone on who writes about it. 

I know Bill brings it up far too much, but I don't think he's really wrong about the issue. 

I actually don't think people are as tribal as they're making out. It's a vocal minority for the most part, but that's what makes the news. No one reports about people getting along. 

 

Edited September 18, 2021 by DoctorAtomic

[letter8358]

My response to Bill's cancel culture and rich people pay more argument...

[Starchild]

4 hours ago, DoctorAtomic said:

And so what if those 65,000 people pay half in New York? Are they paying what they owe though?

Indeed. I wonder if the handful of rich people who pay half of New York's taxes actually own about 95% of its wealth.

[DoctorAtomic]

Yes, that's kind of the natural follow up there. It was just an odd discussion. 

[letter8358]

Dan Savage is more knowledgeable than Bill. He might be a little explicit, but he knows how to say something and push back on Bill. 

[LADreamr]

I think Bill's problem with wokeness and cancel culture is that there are skeletons in his closet.  Stories I've heard about the way he has treated women on his staff, in the past.  I think if it was going to come back to haunt him, it would have by now, but it seems like an attempt to discredit it the whole movement as a way of deflecting any personal responsibility, should anything become public - whether he's conscious of doing that, or not.  Or just that he thinks the way he behaves is just fine, and he resents any pushback on it.

Dan Savage has said things in the past that have bugged me, but for the most part, he is very smart, fearless about speaking his mind and knows how to handle Bill.  He can say what he needs to say without injuring Bill's fragile ego (even his poor audience can never behave exactly right for him), so he can actually get his point across.  

Like @bobbyjoe was saying, Bill does have a staff and could do better about these subjects.  But he doesn't want to learn anything new.  He just wants to hand wave anything that isn't on his short list of things he cares about.  And I don't get what's wrong with being "woke." All it means is that you acknowledge there are groups who have been treated poorly, or dismissed altogether, and you want to be part of making that better.  Cancel culture is a different thing.  I don't think every situation needs to be treated exactly the same.  But we went from a culture that gave these people (usually white men) a complete pass before and now we are holding them accountable.  We need to get better at the nuance, but we couldn't keep ignoring it.

[DoctorAtomic]

I actually think Bill is trying to point out the problem that woke-cancel culture lacks nuance. Maybe he's too mad about it to speak on it more clearly, but that was brought up in the interview. It was kind of the subject of this new rules, and more demonstrably the subject of the new rules about Matt Damon. Now, there may be better examples than he brings up, but I think that's fundamentally his argument. 

I don't think there's anything wrong with being woke - people are sick and tired of either being dismissed or just not willing to put up with ignorance. I think it's a fair argument though that if someone says something stupid 15 years ago and legitimately apologizes that you move on and don't take their career away. 

 

[tessaray]

I think it's worse than not wanting to learn anything new with Bill and the subject of trans people. He gets really pissy when confronted with a topic he can't make off the cuff jokes about anymore. Sometimes you can see him physically stopping himself from leaning into the "politically incorrect" joke that probably would have come next in the past.  Dan Savage was nice about that 'educate me' line but I'm sure he's had a lot of practice. 

Mainstream media has been using the term pregnant people for awhile now.  It sounded odd at first but took all of 10 seconds to process that yeah, trans and others can get pregnant too. 

I don't follow Twitter so I had never heard the term two-spirit  but I like it. 

[Pike Ludwell]

I'd never heard of a Hebrew tradition of twirling chickens - I don't pay much attention to religion. But if true it's great to see Bill ridicule it, like he does with ridiculous practices of any religion. Who else openly ridicules religion? For that sort of thing alone his show is worth having, but there is so much more that makes it worth watching.

[arachne]

6 hours ago, tessaray said:

Mainstream media has been using the term pregnant people for awhile now.  It sounded odd at first but took all of 10 seconds to process that yeah, trans and others can get pregnant too. 

Planned Parenthood uses that term as well, as I found in a recent email from them.

2 hours ago, Pike Ludwell said:

I'd never heard of a Hebrew tradition of twirling chickens - I don't pay much attention to religion.

In the more Orthodox Jewish traditions, it's called Kapparot, and is part of the Yom Kippur observance. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kapparot 

Bill continues to frustrate me. In his final New Rule, he mentions the provision in Texas' abortion law about suing those who help with abortions -- but uses it as a tirade against "snitching" in general. Not cool! 😠

Edited September 19, 2021 by arachne

[wknt3]

On 9/18/2021 at 3:23 AM, bobbyjoe said:

 ETA: Also, Bill is pretty much verbatim repeating the New York Post on the Met Gala, but like a lot of what he does he’s leaving out important facts.   Guests at the Met Gala were required to wear masks when indoors at the event— you can see pictures of them in the masks all over the internet if you do even the most basic research. They didn’t wear the masks when doing their entrance photoshoots in the designated area. That’s pretty much standard practice at all celebrity award shows and events in recent months— take a look at the red carpets this year for the Grammys, MTV Music Awards, etc.

To be fair, Bill hasn't been to an awards show in years...

On 9/18/2021 at 8:33 AM, letter8358 said:

Does Bill think the rich pay more taxes or maybe AOC's dress hit a nerve to him? I say the latter.

Bill is upset at the idea that he would need to pay more to build a pipeline so he can have cheap water for his hydroponic set up. Plus he probably literally doesn't understand if you have 80-90% or more of the income/wealth and pay 50% of the taxes it's unfairly low. Because that would require doing some homework which would cut into his time smoking pot and doing his sold out stand up shows in middle America where I'm sure his income is filtered through various companies and tax shlelters.

Edited September 20, 2021 by wknt3
fixed formatting

[izabella]

10 hours ago, LADreamr said:

And I don't get what's wrong with being "woke." All it means is that you acknowledge there are groups who have been treated poorly, or dismissed altogether, and you want to be part of making that better.

His constant dismissal of "woke culture" leaves no room to discuss any of the underlying issues "woke culture" is concerned about.  He just writes it off with a derisive little label and ignores the social issues which led up to movements to raise awareness and effect change. 

[Tachi Rocinante]

On 9/19/2021 at 12:50 PM, DoctorAtomic said:

I don't think there's anything wrong with being woke - people are sick and tired of either being dismissed or just not willing to put up with ignorance. I think it's a fair argument though that if someone says something stupid 15 years ago and legitimately apologizes that you move on and don't take their career away.

Like anything else, when taken to extremes, it can be ridiculous from a common sense perspective (the Lin-Manuel Miranda example comes to mind).  Bill spends more time on the outliers so it fits his shtick.

Regarding AOC's dress, if she had added the word "More" at the bottom it may have landed better.

[ICantDoThatDave]

21 hours ago, izabella said:

His constant dismissal of "woke culture" leaves no room to discuss any of the underlying issues "woke culture" is concerned about.  He just writes it off with a derisive little label and ignores the social issues which led up to movements to raise awareness and effect change. 

I see it a different way.  He supports all the stances that "woke" is supposed to represent.  He's never said otherwise.  There's really nothing to debate there, so he doesn't.  He's open to learning new terms as we saw this week (but not getting browbeaten for not already knowing them) & is accepting of them when explained to him, although if I had to hazard a guess, he's not exactly down with the idea of people having even one spirit, much less two.  What he rails against, constantly, are the extreme examples where it goes too far & doesn't allow for forgiveness, or personal growth over time.

Not to get too personal, but I was raised in a small, southern, rural town.  Luckily I'm old enough that Twitter & Facebook didn't exist, but I was quite homophobic growing up, because it's all I knew, or was taught.  Once I left my hometown & went to college, I changed my views.  I expanded my life experiences & circle of friends.  As well as my mindset.  I experienced how wrong I was, through interactions with other people.  But if someone dug up my (hypothetical) tweets from decades ago, I'd probably get canceled, no matter how much I've changed since then & now completely support LGBTQ rights.

So I think what Bill is pointing out is how much that is costing Democrats support, when they cancel someone who is ostensibly an ally.  Not only do they get turned off, but their friends get turned off, their supporters get turned off, their followers get turned off.  And the Republicans have a field day with it.  I like that Bill is pointing this out.  I think Bill's main point is: if the Democrats didn't go SO overboard with this stuff, they'd have a lot more supporters.  And I think it's worth him harping on it - it does good, IMO.

[sistermagpie]

1 hour ago, ICantDoThatDave said:

I see it a different way.  He supports all the stances that "woke" is supposed to represent.  

Does he? I mean, it seems more like he just thinks nobody needs to be any more liberal than he is, which means not actually doing much to change the status quo. (And never researching any case of "liberal cancel culture run amuck!" that he hears.)

[ICantDoThatDave]

I mean, can you cite an instance of that?  Bill has always been on the side of civil rights, I feel.  He gave a million dollars to Obama's campaign, so that's clearly doing something.  More than I could do.

What he's doing now, on his show, is (IMO) trying to get Dems to dial it all back a bit on the cancel stuff.  It's because he believes, & I tend to agree, that it turns too many people away from the causes he supports.  He's also trying to push the idea of not demonizing people who *just aren't there yet* - to persuade them, not demonize.  Again, I hate to get all personal anecdotal, because I know that isn't really worth much, but I've seen it in my circle of friends & coworkers: the ones on the fence, or who were "raised that way", can be persuaded.  If you tell them they are awful people or are stupid, they retreat.  And I see Bill doing that, reaching out - making the case to *not* do that.

Also, possibly more to your point, making the case to the people to the left of him: "we need to win".  He's saying, IMO, don't alienate people (especially if they are basically on your side).  If they believe what you believe, then don't push them away due to a forgivable transgression.  Again, just my reading of his "cancel culture" rants.

I admit, it's been the past several episode threads that finally made me post all this (been lurking for years)- I see far too many allies taking umbrage at what he says week after week, when Democrats need all the allies they can get, as opposed to a purity test, which is what I see Bill criticizing all the time, & I can't help agreeing with him, & kinda despairing when I see that sentiment echoed on these episode threads.

[sistermagpie]

1 hour ago, ICantDoThatDave said:

I mean, can you cite an instance of that?  Bill has always been on the side of civil rights, I feel.  He gave a million dollars to Obama's campaign, so that's clearly doing something.  More than I could do.

Dems should politely ignore anti-trans legislation, BLM was fine at first but then it scared everyone off with rioting and of course we can't defund the police, Kavanaugh was obviously just a kid kidding around and it's ridiculous to call that sexual assault, tax the rich is silly, etc.

I think most people can agree that it's not good to act like the people in all his cancel culture stories, but spreading those stories is central to the whole anti-woke strategy. How ordinary people are under attack from crazy college leftists who are making them feel bad for not knowing their pronouns or whatever is exactly their justification for leaning towards Fascism.

I think he's what he says he is--an old-school liberal who's basically supporting what middle-of-the-road liberalism meant to him back when he was young, and that's not dealing with the problems we're dealing with now. And he seems way to ready to throw people who do want to deal with that world under the bus, while normalizing extremists on the right. His definition of extreme on the left is not very progressive.

ETA: Basically, while I get that political strategy is necessary to win elections, there's a point where some people are going to want to deal with problems they see threatening peoples' lives and not just the horse race. 

Edited September 21, 2021 by sistermagpie

[heatherchandler]

4 hours ago, ICantDoThatDave said:

I see it a different way.  He supports all the stances that "woke" is supposed to represent.  He's never said otherwise.  There's really nothing to debate there, so he doesn't.  He's open to learning new terms as we saw this week (but not getting browbeaten for not already knowing them) & is accepting of them when explained to him, although if I had to hazard a guess, he's not exactly down with the idea of people having even one spirit, much less two.  What he rails against, constantly, are the extreme examples where it goes too far & doesn't allow for forgiveness, or personal growth over time.

Not to get too personal, but I was raised in a small, southern, rural town.  Luckily I'm old enough that Twitter & Facebook didn't exist, but I was quite homophobic growing up, because it's all I knew, or was taught.  Once I left my hometown & went to college, I changed my views.  I expanded my life experiences & circle of friends.  As well as my mindset.  I experienced how wrong I was, through interactions with other people.  But if someone dug up my (hypothetical) tweets from decades ago, I'd probably get canceled, no matter how much I've changed since then & now completely support LGBTQ rights.

So I think what Bill is pointing out is how much that is costing Democrats support, when they cancel someone who is ostensibly an ally.  Not only do they get turned off, but their friends get turned off, their supporters get turned off, their followers get turned off.  And the Republicans have a field day with it.  I like that Bill is pointing this out.  I think Bill's main point is: if the Democrats didn't go SO overboard with this stuff, they'd have a lot more supporters.  And I think it's worth him harping on it - it does good, IMO.

I absolutely agree with everything you wrote.  Bill is just trying to say that no one is perfect, everyone has made a mistake.  Stop throwing the baby out with the bath water.

I think he speaks for so many people who are still learning.  No one knows what they don’t know, being open to info is a good thing.

I like Bill, I agree with a lot of his views.

[chediavolo]

On 9/19/2021 at 5:37 PM, Pike Ludwell said:

I'd never heard of a Hebrew tradition of twirling chickens - I don't pay much attention to religion. But if true it's great to see Bill ridicule it, like he does with ridiculous practices of any religion. Who else openly ridicules religion? For that sort of thing alone his show is worth having, but there is so much more that makes it worth watching.

Unfortunately it’s true & it’s obviously animal abuse. The chicken is afterwards slaughtered. In the name of a “religious” ceremony. Archaic and disgusting. 

[heatherchandler]

4 hours ago, chediavolo said:

Unfortunately it’s true & it’s obviously animal abuse. The chicken is afterwards slaughtered. In the name of a “religious” ceremony. Archaic and disgusting. 

I had never heard of this before, and I am horrified.  I respect religious beliefs, but I don't respect a religious ceremony when it involves the abuse of a sentient being.

[DoctorAtomic]

On 9/20/2021 at 1:28 PM, Tachi Rocinante said:

Like anything else, when taken to extremes, it can be ridiculous from a common sense perspective (the Lin-Manuel Miranda example comes to mind).

That's what the media reports though. It needs a better context on the show. Not everything that is 'canceled' is the sky is falling, but sure, stuff like that, or even Matt Damon, it can be much. I don't really having a problem with Bill addressing the issue, but it's the pearl clutching that rolls my eyes. 

On 9/20/2021 at 6:52 PM, ICantDoThatDave said:

What he's doing now, on his show, is (IMO) trying to get Dems to dial it all back a bit on the cancel stuff. 

You're correct in pointing out that the gop far out-messages democrats on the culture and the extreme canceling can be what Obama called the purity test or circular firing squad. He tends to want to cancel all cancel culture, but there are some transgressions that should be called out. I think the constant week in and week out can turn people off. I don't think this is on the minds of your average liberal voter week to week. 

I don't think those liberals are not going to vote in 2022, but gop-ers can turn out more if these extreme cancelings aren't dialed down. I don't think twitter is that much on an influence on the electorate at large though. 

 

 

[Avaleigh]

 

On 9/20/2021 at 6:42 PM, ICantDoThatDave said:

I see it a different way.  He supports all the stances that "woke" is supposed to represent.  He's never said otherwise.  There's really nothing to debate there, so he doesn't.  He's open to learning new terms as we saw this week (but not getting browbeaten for not already knowing them) & is accepting of them when explained to him, although if I had to hazard a guess, he's not exactly down with the idea of people having even one spirit, much less two.  What he rails against, constantly, are the extreme examples where it goes too far & doesn't allow for forgiveness, or personal growth over time.

Not to get too personal, but I was raised in a small, southern, rural town.  Luckily I'm old enough that Twitter & Facebook didn't exist, but I was quite homophobic growing up, because it's all I knew, or was taught.  Once I left my hometown & went to college, I changed my views.  I expanded my life experiences & circle of friends.  As well as my mindset.  I experienced how wrong I was, through interactions with other people.  But if someone dug up my (hypothetical) tweets from decades ago, I'd probably get canceled, no matter how much I've changed since then & now completely support LGBTQ rights.

So I think what Bill is pointing out is how much that is costing Democrats support, when they cancel someone who is ostensibly an ally.  Not only do they get turned off, but their friends get turned off, their supporters get turned off, their followers get turned off.  And the Republicans have a field day with it.  I like that Bill is pointing this out.  I think Bill's main point is: if the Democrats didn't go SO overboard with this stuff, they'd have a lot more supporters.  And I think it's worth him harping on it - it does good, IMO.

I agree with everything in your post. I've always thought that Bill's main point with regard to so-called cancel/consequence culture has been that the left is losing support from people who could have been or used to be allies. People are being alienated unnecessarily and to me, it's too important a time to lose support given how close some of these elections are going to be. Furthermore, I think it's a huge (and unfair) leap to think that just because a person is turned off by some of the more extreme versions of cancel/consequence culture that they'll somehow use this as an excuse to run into the arms of Fascism. 

I also disagree with the idea that Bill should refrain from bringing up a story out of fear that the right wing media will also cover it. I don't think he should necessarily have to ignore real stories or pretend that these examples of toxic cancel/consequence culture don't exist. I like that there's someone on the left who is willing to challenge some of the more problematic examples of cancel/consequence culture. To me it demonstrates that there are still people on the left who are willing to consider all of the factors before canceling a person because the social media mob has decided that they need to be punished. 

As for Bill supposedly losing his liberal cred--isn't it more important that he's in sync with the party when it comes to the main issues? In this episode (and others) he let everyone know that he was very much against the recall in California. He also pointed out what a waste spending all of that money was and how it could have been spent on taking care of the homeless. This is just one example of many. 

[sistermagpie]

2 hours ago, Avaleigh said:

I agree with everything in your post. I've always thought that Bill's main point with regard to so-called cancel/consequence culture has been that the left is losing support from people who could have been or used to be allies. People are being alienated unnecessarily and to me, it's too important a time to lose support given how close some of these elections are going to be. Furthermore, I think it's a huge (and unfair) leap to think that just because a person is turned off by some of the more extreme versions of cancel/consequence culture that they'll somehow use this as an excuse to run into the arms of Fascism. 

 

So what exactly is this cancel culture, exactly that's our big danger? Our current reality is that there are only two choices, and if you're turned off by one enough to vote against it or not vote, you're supporting the other choice.

So what exactly is the fear here, based on stuff Bill is saying, that makes it too hard to vote against the people openly advocating for getting rid of Democracy so they're in power forever and making permanent all the policies they want? And is it actually not happening on the right as well? What powers are being used to enforce this cancel culture?