Even when Bill Maher takes a break from his late night HBO talk show, Real Time, he can't help but to stir up a bit of trouble. Without Real Time as his medium for mocking religion, Maher took to Twitter to blame the San Bernardino shooting spree on religious zealotry.
Shortly after the names of the San Bernardino shooters started appearing in news with very little additional information, Maher slammed Twitter with a post saying that random shootings and Islamic Terrorists are two completely different things. The huge difference apparently being that one is attempting to acquire and detonate weapons of mass destruction on American soil.
Stop comparing random shooters to Islamic terrorists. Apples & Oranges. One is bent on acquiring WMD to set off in America. End. of. Story.
— Bill Maher (@billmaher) December 2, 2015
A lot of angry people, including fans of Real Time, were quick to blast Maher for his post for vilifying Islamics. It is important to note, however, Maher did not vilify the whole of the Islam, but only the terrorists of the religion.
Salon reports that the following day, Maher, "expanded on the idea that religion is to blame for Syed Rizwan Farook, 28, and Tashfeen Malik, 27, killing 14 at the Inland Regional Center via a quotation from Steven Weinberg.
"W/ or w/out religion U wld have good ppl doing good things & evil ppl doing evil thingsBut 4 good ppl to do evil things that take religion" — Bill Maher (@billmaher) December 4, 2015
Maher follows the quote up with a quip about the murderous couple dropping off their baby "to go to a massacre" and points to religion as the reason you get seemingly normal people who would do something like that.
Steven Weinberg said that, and that's how you get ppl who "always acted normal" (don't they always?) dropping a baby off to go to a massacre — Bill Maher (@billmaher) December 4, 2015
Theodore Ross of New Republic made the following comment in response to Maher's scathing remarks, "Some things you can reliably count on Maher for in the wake of religiously motivated terrorism: a view of religion as totally separable from politics, history, and material circumstances; a literalist reading of religious texts; an absolutist, Manichean account of human nature in which some are inherently good and some are inherently evil; and an itchy tweeting finger. In that respect, Maher and the hardline fundamentalists he likes to skewer have a lot in common where it really counts."
On the one hand, Maher has a point. There are few things people will commit mass murder for. Religious zealotry is almost certainly near the top of that short list, if not leading the pack. While we may not be able to read Farook and Malik's mind, there is little doubt they were motivated by religion. Wars have been waged since the beginning of time in the name of religion. Christians are not innocent in these malicious acts.
That said, Mr. Ross makes an excellent point too. You can't simply assume that religion is the root cause of all evil. Doing so is simply trading one extremist ideal for another.
What are your thoughts? Has Real Time's Bill Maher hit it on the nose, or do your views fall more in line with Theordore Ross's? Let's talk about it. Use the comments below to share your own ideas.
