Bill Maher on Tyre Nichols Killing: Focus on Race Keeps Us ‘From Fixing Some of the Realer Problems’
Comic and political pundit Bill Maher reacted to the killing of Tyre Nichols and a pair of mass shootings this week by pointing out that all were carried out by nonwhites, and claiming that “mono-focus on race” hinders the fixing of “realer problems.”
On Friday night’s edition of HBO’s Real Time with Bill Maher, Maher derided what he claimed is a single-minded focus on race after mass shootings like the ones in Monterey Park and Half Moon Bay and police incidents like the Nichols beating, saying it “short-circuits” work to fix “realer problems.
Guest Tim Ryan added a point about how cops are “stressed” and “underpaid”:
BILL MAHER: This week, people learn the names of a couple of cities here in California. Half Moon Bay and Monterey Park was the other one.
And, you know, these shootings happen we go through these this ritual where then we wait for the, for them to announce the race of the shooter. We’re waiting for the Oscar nominations because that’s, you know, somehow to a lot of people, the most important thing. And I just thought it was very interesting that this week, Asians were killed by Asians. Two Asian men who were, you know, 66 and 72.
And then this week, we just got this video of the Memphis Five. A Black man is brutally beaten in Memphis by five cops. They’re all Black.
I guess what I’m asking is America’s culture of violence. It does go deeper than race. Right? And I think this mono-focus we have on race is short-circuiting us trying to fix some of the realer problems. Would you agree?
TIM RYAN: Well, definitely deeper concerns here. And this is an opportunity for us to have that conversation. The conversation about mental health, the conversation about guns, the conversation about.
BILL MAHER: Cops.
TIM RYAN: The cops and the stress, and the stress the cops are under. And I’m not defending these guys, of course, this is a tragedy. They should be prosecuted, full extent of the law, the whole nine yards. But if we don’t at some level realize that it’s not a white cop or a Black cop, it’s a cop who’s under stress, who’s underpaid. I had cops in my congressional district, tBill. They were getting paid $14 an hour.
