Ep. #614: Masih Alinejad, Van Jones, Caitlin Flanagan

Welcome to an HBO podcast from the HBO Late Night Series, Real Time with Bill Ma.

Start the clock.

Thank you very much.

much.

Thank you, Let it's going.

I appreciate that.

Great to see you all.

Thank you.

Thank you very much, Saint Louis.

Thank you.

I appreciate it.

All right, what do I do now?

Thank you very much.

I appreciate it.

Thank you very much.

I know you're

In a weather challenge state, we feel pretty good because we're watching

with our hearts open to our friends in Florida.

Terrible thing there.

You saw what Hurricane Ion

came in as a hurricane, then went out to sea as a tropical storm, came back as a hurricane.

This thing is more confused than Demi Lovato.

No, our hearts go out to it.

But

it's the same story, like every year when we see these things, you know, the coverage is always the same.

These people are shocked that they live in a house built on sticks on the beach

in the most hurricane-proof-developed area of the country,

and then the house isn't there.

You know, you're living on an island under sea level, you know, in a paper-mâché home.

And they're like,

Well, we're going to write it out,

write it out.

Who is in charge of the building codes down there?

The three little pigs?

I'll say this about Californians.

When the wildfires come, we don't write it out.

We grab our Pelotons and our trophy wives and we get the fuck out of there, okay?

So, anyway, but here is a calming news this week.

We found out why Queen Elizabeth died.

Really?

They put this out, old age.

Really?

Oh, wow.

I thought she might have fell out a window in Moscow.

Oh, that situation is not getting any better with Russia.

Russia annexed 15%

of Ukraine this week.

Did you see that?

Just to say important event.

This is the largest annexation Russia has done since the, well, I got to go back to the Republican Party in 2016.

Well, Republicans and MAGA, two different things now, MAGA people.

We got to make that distinction.

Ginny Thomas is in the news this week.

She is the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.

Wow.

She appeared before the January 6th Committee and told them she still thinks that Trump won in 2020 the election was stolen.

Wow.

They're a conspiracy theorist, and then there's this lady.

I mean,

she also said that she thinks for the last 35 years there's been a black man lurking around her home.

The Republicans, of course, lost their shit this week because Biden made a gaffe, the kind he's made for 50 years

that matters not about anything.

But there's a congresswoman named Jackie Walorski, who unfortunately died a couple of months ago.

There's 535 members of Congress, okay?

So Biden is speaking, and he calls for Jackie.

Jackie, where are you?

Well, dead, yes, okay.

I'm not saying it was a great moment, but

okay, again, 535 members.

He forgot that she was dead.

The last guy forgot we were a democracy.

Okay, can we have a little perspective?

Trump once was giving a speech

about the American Revolution came up in this speech.

And he said, our army manned the air,

rammed the ramparts, and took over the airports in 1776.

And he was reading it.

I swear to God.

So, you know.

I'm just going to say, one day the phone is going to ring and Marjorie Taylor Greene is going to answer the gun.

And then we can talk about whose brain works all the time and whose doesn't, okay?

Oh, Marjorie Taylor Green, back on the market.

I don't know if you heard.

But she's getting divorced.

Yes, very sad.

She caught him with another imbecile.

And here's the story of the week that really blew my mind the most.

Apple, the corporation, not the fruit,

fired one of their vice presidents for telling a joke.

Somebody from TikTok was going around asking people,

what do you do for a living?

And this guy, you know, it's TikTok, just trying to be a little funny.

He said, I have rich cars, I play golf, and I fondle big-breasted women.

Don.

He should have said, I sell people shit they don't need.

That's good to see.

Also, the line was a line from Arthur, the movie, which was the biggest comedy of 1981.

And this guy just said that line.

Where is he making people feel unsafe?

Blockbuster?

You know, 40 years ago, this line, everybody in this country thought it was funny.

Today you say it, and Candyman appears.

I just want to say, Elon, if there's room on the next rocket, I'm ready to go.

All right, we got a great show.

Dan Jones and Caitlin Flanagan are here.

But first up, she is a journalist, activist, and author of the book, The Wind in My Hair, My Fight for Freedom in Modern Iran.

Mossy Alinajad.

Hey.

Absolutely, you're a very brave person.

And I want to get to, of course, all the things we want to talk to you about today with what's going on in Iran, but let's do it like they do on episodic shows and start with the most dramatic scene first, and then we'll go five years early.

Okay, so a couple of years ago,

four Iranian agents were actually charged in absentee with trying to kidnap you.

Can you believe that?

Well, I'd like to.

Okay, so

tell us back now.

Why were they trying to kidnap you?

What was going on?

First of all, they're scared of women.

And right now that I'm talking to you, they killed a 20-year-old woman.

They're even scared of her hair, Mahsa Amini.

But when they came after me here, my job was just giving voice to voiceless women inside Iran.

I launched a campaign against compulsory hijab

because I couldn't cover my head.

Big hair.

And then

while I was publishing videos of women fighting back the morality police being harassed in the street, filming them, that created a huge anger among mullahs because they hate when they see that women are fighting back hijab police, morality police.

That's why they tried to kidnap me.

So it's really silent.

What we're seeing now in Iran, we've seen for two weeks now, and it's not stopping apparently.

All these demonstrations, women have finally had enough.

As you said, this young woman was killed in custody, taken in by the morality police.

They claim some bullshit about pre-existing conditions, being she was a woman, I think, was the preexisting condition.

And so there's all these riots.

A lot of people have died.

My question to you is, now we've seen this before in Iran.

There was a kind of an uprising in 2009.

We saw the Arab Spring in 2011.

Obviously, Persians are not Arabs, but we're talking about the same religion

that's behind all this.

Is this time going to be different?

Of course.

Believe me, because first of all,

women are burning the headscarf.

And this is not just a small piece of cloth for Iranian women and women in Afghanistan.

This is the most visible symbol of a religious dictatorship.

In 2009, it was about like internal fight between conservative, reformists.

This time, from the beginning, the brutal death of Masa Amini created a huge anger.

Iranian women not only burning the headscarves,

they're actually trunting against the dictators from the first day.

So the brutal death of Mahsa Amini actually became a turning point for women who have been pushing back this gender apartheid regime for years.

So take me through what's going to happen in the next months or years.

I mean, this regime is just not going to give up.

No, don't say that Bill.

Don't say that.

Okay, they are just going to give up.

No, because we've been seeing right now for years and years, we had the fear inside us.

No?

Now this is the mullahs.

Believe me, the Iranian regime, they're really scared of their women.

And right now, this has become a tipping point for the Islamic Republic.

Because it's not just in Iran.

Across the world, people are watching that.

Wow, these fearless women walking towards the morality police, and they're ready.

And TikTok generations are being killed right now in the streets.

So that scares the regime.

And I always say that this for the Islamic Republic, for Taliban, this compulsory job is like the Berlin Wall.

Now, we're tearing this wall down, and the Islamic Republic won't exist.

This is the end of the regime.

I hope you're right.

But

I mean, you mentioned Afghanistan.

We pulled out of Afghanistan.

The Taliban took over, and it went right back to the bad old days.

That's why I don't have any hope on the Biden administration.

I don't have any hope on Western countries.

They abandoned my sister in Afghanistan.

But guess who came to the streets to support Iranian women?

The first group who came to the streets were women of Afghanistan.

Can you believe that?

The Western feminists who actually went to my country, wore hijab, they bowed to the Taliban.

They didn't take the street yet

why are liberals so moronic about the problem

really

it just breaks my heart because for years and years we have been warning them about the dangers of morality police you know why because

most of them speak in a perfect English and they have who actually talk about Islam and Islamic countries they never go and live under Sharia laws, but they don't even let us talk about our own experience.

You know, yes.

I grew up in

a country where I was told that if you show your hair, you're going to go to jail.

You will receive lashes.

You will get killed like Mahso Amini.

But here, they tell me that shh, if you talk about this, you're going to cause Islamophobia.

Phobia is irrational.

But believe me, my fear and the fear of millions of Iranian women in Afghanistan is rational.

Yes, there's that.

You know, honestly, you're not as scared of Islamic laws.

You're not as scared of being killed?

Yes, I am.

I mean, if you don't, then there's something wrong with you.

Absolutely.

Yes, I am.

I've been saying it for years.

Oh, actually, I was told that don't go to Bilma's show because you're going to be cancelled because he's Islamophobic.

And I was like, my God, again, you're thinking about canceling me just because of going to this show.

I'm fighting against cancellation.

Neither one of us is Islamophobic, and we agree on that.

Look, it's that we...

You're right.

are,

I mean, I'm a traditional liberal.

You know, I believe that you should treat people with freedom and dignity.

And the fact that, I mean, there's a young woman named Yasmeen Muhammad, I'm sure you've heard of her.

She was brought up in Canada.

She wrote a book called Unveiled, How Western Liberals, I think, Empower Radical Islam, which is, I think, what we're saying.

Why are Western liberals empowering these forces of real evil?

She was put in a, I forget what it's a niqab.

is that the full body?

It's not a different between niqab or hijab.

It's all together.

Yeah, yeah.

Well, it's one thing to have a head covering is people should be free to dress however they want.

But that's not the same thing as you would much rather just have to wear that than something that covers your face.

If you ask women in Iran, Afghanistan, believe me, for us it's not different that you are forced to cover your hair or your face.

It's all about controlling women.

Of course it is.

But

I'm sorry.

Your face is still exposed.

No, no, no, look, the woman got killed because of the.

I understand, but there's a difference between being able to have your face in the world and not even having that.

Can I read you Yasmeen's quote?

Okay, this is her describing that when she was married off to somebody who went to Al-Qaeda, and she's living in Toronto, by the way.

She's a sister.

She's in Canada, yes.

Okay.

I just want people to hear her version of what it's like to have to wear that all day.

She says, when her husband put this, she said, that really helps in turning me into a nothing that the man can control very easily.

It just suppresses your humanity entirely.

It's like a portable sensory deprivation chamber and you are no longer connected to humanity.

You can't see properly, you can't hear properly, you can't speak properly.

People can't see you.

You can only see them.

Just little things like passing people in the street and just making eye contact and smiling, that's gone.

You're no longer part of this world until you are very quickly just shrivel up into nothing under there.

That's what I would like liberals to keep in their minds.

Yes.

Every time they say Islamophobia.

And that.

Exactly.

That's what's going on.

And that actually is.

How can you enable that?

Look, I'm not sure.

Why do they enable that?

I invite them all to go and live under Sharia laws.

In Iran and Afghanistan, they would say no.

They always, always try to downplay our cause, but they don't even dare.

They don't even dare to live only one day wearing the burgha or hijab.

Some of them, actually, I challenge Ilhan Omar because you know about the hero.

Ilhan Omar, yes.

So she's coming.

Muslim congresswoman from Minnesota, yes.

Yeah, she's coming now with the legislation, gathering information around the world that who causes Islamophobia.

I was like, oh my God, even here in America now, someone monitoring us that we're going to cause Islamophobia, those who lash us, those who kill us, those who hang us, those who, if we say that I don't want to be Muslim anymore, they're going to kill you.

Those actually create phobia.

I mean, of course not me.

And you invited

Congressman Omar and AOC to come with me to the

did they decline your request?

No, instead they bullying me.

Instead, they're saying that you're being paid by

U.S.

government.

Oh my god.

So Elhan Omar is not being paid by the US government?

No, honestly.

Well, you're a very brave person.

I have to be brave because I don't have any other option.

Because my people are getting killed.

And for years and years, I've been telling all the Western feminism from the European Parliament.

Can you believe they invited me to talk about Burkini ban?

I went to European Parliament, I hijacked their cause, and I said, how hypocrites you are.

You bring me here to condemn Burkini ban, Muslim ban.

But when it comes to wearing hijab, you bow to the Iranian government, you wear hijab, and now you're wrong.

My people in Iran, they are right.

Now a stand-up for Iranian women.

Thank you.

Keep your hair flying.

You always have a friend here, you know that.

All right, thank you very much.

All right, Mossi, let's meet our panel.

Okay.

All right.

And there he is, a CNN political commentator and host of the podcast Uncommon Ground with Van Jones.

Van Jones is over here.

And she's a staff writer at the Atlantic and author of Girl Land.

Caitlin Flanagan is back with us.

Caitlin Flanagan.

Okay.

So I'm trying to find some hope in the world.

I saw this week, I was watching The Storm, and then I'm reading about how Biden and DeSantis worked together very peaceably.

Two people who absolutely have nothing in common politically and could be facing off against each other at some point.

And yet, you know, we had a storm and the President of the United States didn't ignore Florida because they didn't vote for him.

And he didn't lecture them like Trump did when we had fought, you should do more raking.

You know,

squeegee Florida.

It wouldn't be so.

Am I just drawing it straws here that this is a harbinger of some hope that DeSantis and Biden can put aside differences and work together like presidents of different and governors different used to do?

The bar has gotten that low.

That is how the people are literally clapping because grown-ups are acting like grown-ups.

Nobody threw.

We went to Puerto Rico and he threw the

towels at people.

None of that happened.

Now we're all happy.

I forgot that.

He didn't throw towels at people.

Okay, so I find there's a paradox with Biden, and I want to ask you about it.

Like, when I talk to people in the last few months, it's like first thing is he should not run again.

I'm talking about Democrats who are like pretty much, you know, in the camp, and they're like, we should not.

And then they say, but do you think he's doing a good job?

Doing great.

He's doing great.

We don't want any more of that.

I just want to know what the,

what do you think?

I think one of the reasons he's so appealing is that he harkens back to when the Democratic Party was really the party of the working man and woman.

Didn't matter your race, didn't matter where you were in the country, that

strong union, you know, National Labor Relations Board, like they came after Amazon for union busting.

I mean, he's doing a great job of things that really matter to us.

But the reason he remembers those techniques is he's super old.

And there's nothing wrong with being old.

There's no shame to it.

I'm old,

but

there are, you know, but there's natural processes that happen, and it seems like he is certainly losing his acuity, which a lot of older men do, and compensating it with this wonderful ability to get people to work together.

But I would say I don't think we need to get a panel of gerontologists to look at the situation.

We've all known old people who are like, yeah, we'll take the key now.

I'm so disappointed that you,

like me, not so young, would say this.

It's such bullshit.

First of all, the same week that he did this, Kavala Harris was over in Korea saying our longtime ally, North Korea.

Again, the bot is low, but I'm just saying that he is.

Nobody's wrong to say

he's the same guy.

He was always a gaffe machine.

He's actually more disciplined than he used to be.

Well, from Amazon's point of view, that's true.

Look, I think the reality is when Biden is strong, he's very strong.

And when he's weak, he's very weak.

And that's what people are responding to.

And I think, you know, from my point of view, you got a couple of challenges here.

If the public in 2024 sees what they perceive to be a weak insider, versus a scary outsider, a Trump or a DeSantis, if that's a perception, what you've seen in France, what you've seen in Italy, what you've seen in Sweden is the public breaks toward that scary outsider.

And so I do think that people have a reason to be concerned if he continues to be perceived to be weak.

But the reality is, what's the alternative to Biden?

That's the question I ask people.

This guy has a track record now on everything that people said was impossible.

They said it was impossible to get anything done on guns.

He got it done.

Impossible to get anything done on climate.

He got it done.

We had infrastructure weak every week under the Trump administration and nothing happened.

Biden got it done.

So at a certain point, you've got to give the guys credit.

You got to give the guys credit.

And then, and the other thing is

negotiating drug prices with Medicare.

We've been talking about that for 30 years.

Obama tried it.

Yeah, look.

Everybody.

There's a huge factory opening in Ohio that the kind of thing Trump promised endlessly

never showed up.

Got to get rid of them.

I see your point.

Can't have any more on the bottom.

So

you don't see at all any concerns at all?

It's just when he's looking at it.

Compared to what?

I mean,

would I like to have great wisdom in the body of a 20-year-old?

Yes, everybody would.

But that's not life.

And it doesn't matter.

He doesn't have to like...

Okay.

No, I admit he is going to have trouble in the debates.

Debates are going to look bad.

Prepare for it now.

There's going to be some senior moments.

He could show up without pants.

That's true.

He could do an Admiral Stockdale.

Where am I?

Where am I?

It could happen.

It doesn't matter.

It has nothing to do with running the country.

You run the country behind the scenes.

This is all show.

And that's always been Biden's thing is behind the scene and getting people together and just talking and pushing legislation through.

So, yeah, so he has a unique skill set, I guess you would say, that is very powerful right now.

You've got to be proud of the guy.

I mean, I just want to say.

You've got to be proud of the guy.

I got a chance to work for him in the Obama administration.

He really does give a damn.

And there's one thing to care, and there's something else to be confident.

He cares, he's confident, he got something done.

I think sometimes it's hard for us.

We've been so depressed, we've been so beat down for so long with Trump.

We don't know how to have a happy day.

We can have some happy days right now,

but we're just like afraid to.

It's like, well, you know,

I don't know what more a president could do than he's done in the past three months.

I just don't know.

And I got to tell you, he's not giving it up.

No, I mean, he waited a very long time.

He's like Dracula.

I have crossed oceans of time.

I have crossed

oceans of time

to be the president.

Once you have that real estate and you wake up in the White House and your office is the oval, I just don't think you give it up.

Unless...

Oh, no, he's not going to quit.

He's not giving it up.

He's not a quitter, his whole life is a good idea.

And it's very hard to take the nomination away from

the president.

Yeah, that's not the sitting president.

And what I could see is replacing the vice president

because

she's not very popular

anywhere

and it didn't seem to work out.

And

I don't know, that's been done before in a ticket.

You know, I mean, a lot of people.

Chelsea Gabbard, remember, that was that moment in the debate where she brought up these, that there are men and women in California that are in prison for these pot deals, and then she was laughing about getting high on the radio station.

And it was just like Chulsie Gabbard was like this heat-seeking missile.

That was the end of it you know she's got a lot of in addition to being for some reason

an off-putting person she

she also has I think a lot of baggage that probably wouldn't do well under a lot of scrutiny I just think she's a bad politician and I don't I mean I don't I don't think I think she's a very bright person but I don't know just see but I can see them doing that because a lot of the problem with Biden being old is oh if he dies then you know you're gonna get this person Okay, so here's the problem with the Democratic Party.

They're so boxed in by identity politics that you cannot conceive of a Democratic ticket that doesn't have a woman, person of color on it, and pretty soon you're going to line up behind that gay Latino and you're going to have to have

a deaf Eskimo

be the.

Am I right that they are boxed in by identity politics?

Well, first of of all, I see it differently in that I don't think Kamala has caught far yet or found her footing.

I think that's true.

I think the polling data says that, but I don't think that he would be a weight on the ticket.

What I will say is this.

You talk about identity politics.

Joe Biden is an example of identity politics.

Joe Biden is an example of black voters saying, we think we need to put a white guy in there.

And nobody says he's an identity politics guy.

Pence.

How do you get pins?

You have Trump, who is not the most saintly guy in the world, needs somebody whose identity is conservative Christian.

He goes and gets pins.

So politics is about identity.

That's what it is.

But whenever there's a person of color or a woman, we say, well, that's identity politics.

It's all identity politics.

People's got to put a ticket that can win.

I don't know.

I have to say, I wonder, because I think you're right.

Biden has done...

Really, when I just sat down before coming here with, you know, I always talked to Noah Redlick before I come to do your show, did I hire him?

And we just went through all the positive things that he's done that I had not heard of as just sort of a general education person with a general education who watches the news but cycle after cycle was taken over by a graphic a comic book in a school of a trans kid giving a blowjob to another kid and it's like what does that have to do with anything why and why are we pushing behind this wait okay

here it says

I don't know what

you're gonna do how everybody's finding these terrifying books I heard this is a book in the school It's a graphic novel because

that they're teaching?

Well, it's in the library, so we can go to this hell debate.

And I guess it had to be in pictures because they haven't taught them how to read.

But

they,

and

I can't remember the title, but it's something about, you know, and they show the picture of this trans kid who's

blowing this other person, and it's in the library.

And I don't know why I'm the one that's talking about this.

On the one hand, I'm not even against,

because I'm sure the book has...

What is your point of view on it, is what I want to know.

Are we pro

blowjob books in the library, or did we burn them?

I'm mixed on the blowjob books in the library, because I think that,

much as I think we shouldn't, I think that, you know, as my recollection has it, these things get figured out very naturally.

But I do think, and it seems perverse and actually hideous to happen.

On the other hand.

I did not, to be honest, figure out blowjobs when I was...

I remember asking in a health class, can you get pregnant from a blowjob?

You did?

Yeah.

I mean,

that's where we learned sex in fucking gym.

It was the gym teacher.

Right.

It was the gym teacher.

Once a week, instead of doing the gym stuff, you had, can you get pregnant from a blowjob?

I mean, you have to ask at some point in your life.

I was 19, but still.

Well, we're past that now.

We're so past that.

And I do think.

Where are we, Kaylee?

Okay, where are we?

So here's this library.

I don't know.

I guess there's a lot of them.

They have this picture book of a trans kid blowing another kid.

Back lunch I got it.

And I am thinking to myself, that image has probably got so much more in that story, humanity,

and probably relationship and kindness than 1% of what that act is demonstrated by in the porn-saturated world that we all live in.

That I don't know, go ahead and keep the book, but it shouldn't be like the CHIPS Acts get passed, and we're talking about this blowjob comic book.

Even on the show, we are.

Yeah, I know.

Well, I mean,

to be fair, we weren't planning on doing it.

I don't know why we're talking about it.

But if you're

just saying that.

Your point is that our high, I've just, Will, I may have overdone it on the blowjob.

I just think that's plausible.

But I just think we get caught up in our argument.

Like, we're pushing things through, and we get caught up in these really crazy arguments.

Maybe Maybe it's just me.

Let's move on.

Well, picking and bloodshot.

There is a new conservative.

The king of blends, they call me.

And there is a new conservative dating app.

You know, one of my big complaints, I must say, about America is that everybody is always in their own little bubble, their own little silo.

I'm going to do a whole thing on it at the end of the show next week about nobody mingles anymore.

And, for example, dating apps, you know, that farmers only, just farming, just, just,

I don't want to date anybody who doesn't milk something.

What the fuck, you know?

I mean, there's J-Date, you know, just Jews only.

So

not helping this cause.

There's another one now, Peter Thiel, the billionaire, and he's a very conservative guy.

He's putting out a new dating app called The Right Stuff, only conservatives.

I mean, it's a real thing.

Well, we got a hold of some of these profiles.

You can't.

We want to hear what people say on the right stuff.

For example,

a rusty from Chattanooga says, looking for that special one to help me find love, and Hillary's email.

Kirk from San Diego says, I like romantic dinners by Tiki Torchlight and long walks on an oil soap.

Me, it's easy.

Very conservative.

Tommy from Tupelo says, I'm hung, like Mike Pence should be.

Susan from Clayton says, tired of patrolling the neighborhood for suspicious black men alone.

Floyd from Branson says, need a woman who'll wash my These Colors Don't Run t-shirt in cold water, god damn it.

Glenn says, I like long walks in my walk-in bathtub.

Gary from Midland, your compound or mine.

Carrie from Memphis says, dog lovers, specifically the ones used on civil rights protesters.

Danny from Sacramento says, big Ann Rand fans.

Atlas shrugged, but you won't see one my, oh fuck.

You won't when you see my penis.

So Ellen from Knoxville says,

purity ring wearer.

The Lord is my savior.

Up for anal.

No rhinos.

Okay, so.

All right, so I'm going to change the subject slightly.

And

I'm going to

do it all, and then you iron this old prod into talking about these blowdown books in the library.

Right, we've got to watch out for Biden's book.

But no, But there's a really interesting political poll that showed that Republicans don't want Trump to be the nominee way more than they didn't want him in 2020 by 20%.

He's dropped 20%.

That's an awful lot among Republicans.

It's only half the story.

So they want somebody else, probably DeSantis.

But if Trump is the nominee, he's still in a dead heat with the Democrat, which just shows whoever the Democrat is, it's like it's not even on the table.

So I always ask this question, the toxic D.

What makes people hate Democrats so much that even, because I've said this before, when you talk to Trump people, they say, your biggest misconception is that I like him.

Right, right, right.

Okay.

Exhibit 1922.

Article in The Atlantic last week.

The Atlantic, a very reputable

party in clique and publishes things from around the political spectrum.

Yes, I mean, highly respected.

Yes.

This article is called Separating Sports by Sex.

Doesn't make sense.

Yes, it does.

And this is the problem

with the Democrats.

They are the party of no common common sense.

You found your blowjob.

Yes, I am.

Yes.

All these things together are our problem.

These insane social issues and identitarian positions are distracting.

Can I just read some of the things

this article?

Maintaining this binary in youth sports, maintaining this binary, meaning boys and girls on different teams when they're young, reinforces the idea that boys are inherently bigger, faster, and stronger.

They are.

This is

a notion that's been challenged by scientists for years.

No witnesses.

And these are like, these are the follow the science people.

Follow the science.

Well,

I actually read the article.

I was shocked shocked by the headline.

I read the article.

I think that they're making a particular point, which is that there are some sports,

soccer, for instance, where a really, really good girl is better than a mediocre boy.

And if she wants to play on the boys' team, she should probably be allowed.

I think that makes sense.

I think that what doesn't make sense is when a really, really good boy wants to play on the girl's team, because that is going to result in, I think, an unfair advantage.

I do think that that this issue around the gender binary

has taken up way too much space in the public conversation.

I think that people are weary of it.

I think that people having to put the she's and the this and that and the pronouns on their Zoom, all of that stuff starts to send a signal, I think, to working class voters.

that these people are not concerned about the things that affect me every day.

They're not concerned about inflation.

They're not concerned about, which is not to say you can't care about everybody, but there's something that's out of balance.

And so I think that when we start sending the cultural signal that we're more concerned about the pronoun you put on your Zoom call than we are concerned about the fact that you don't have a house or a job, I think the party's off track.

Why don't you grind it?

I hear Biden's gonna need a person of color on the chicken.

You know, I've been blessed in my life.

I grew up on

the edge of a small town in a red state.

I went to all public schools.

I got a minority scholarship to go to the University of Tennessee at Martin.

And it changed my life.

I used to work at a local newspaper in the mailroom running the presses with a bunch of white guys.

And in one academic year, I got a chance to leave there, go to school.

I came back.

I came in the front door of that newspaper.

I took a shower before before work.

Before I had gone in the back, I took a shower after work.

That one year of college changed my life.

And by the time I graduated from college, all those white guys had lost their jobs because they brought in a printing press who was a big robot and didn't need the guys.

So I understand

how people can sometimes feel that they are being left behind, they're being left out, they've been sold down the river by both parties.

And I think the Democrats miss opportunity after opportunity.

to tell people we get that and we care about it.

I've heard you so many times say that we've lost the white working class and you're describing the white working class and I agree with what you're saying now is that

we should not be shunning them.

We should be bringing them back in.

And I think what the opportunity that we miss when we go down these cultural rabbit holes is to tell these guys the reason that we are mad at the working class white guys is because we need them.

We need them.

We can't have the country we want without them.

Why whether we need to be able to do that?

Because they're veterans often?

Because they're veterans often, because they're small business owners, because they're granddads, because they're good people, and I don't care how they vote.

We got young people in this country going to bed hungry, and we need those guys on their side.

So you're saying, I am so agreeing with you so much, I'm so happy to hear you say that.

So you're saying we need a Democratic party that says it's not about race, it's not about identity, it's about the working class, and we're the party of the working class regardless.

It's not about the black working class, the brown working class, and the reviled white working class.

What I'm saying is

that we need each other.

What I'm saying is that people are hurting and uncertain from Appalachia to the hood, and we're not going to get out of this by ourselves.

We need each other.

And if you don't start with that, you want to get a bunch of people.

So

I got you on this.

I watched a little bit of this documentary called Deconstructing Karen.

Have you heard about this?

It's about this organization called Race to Dinner.

I've been reading about it for several years.

It's two women of color who get white liberal women to pay them a lot of money to go to their house, have a dinner, and yell at them that they're racist.

This is on the race to dinner about me pay.

This is what they're selling about themselves.

Dear white women,

you cause immeasurable pain and damage to black, indigenous, and brown people.

These dinners are a starting point to start thinking through how you actively uphold white supremacy every minute of every day.

So I'd like to give you the opportunity to kill yourself right now.

I don't need to kill myself because these two women that have founded this, if they were Shark Tank, I would invest in them because they have found a market.

They found a market.

They made a product.

They found these nitwits to pay for it.

You know,

what's wrong with that?

And no one,

I have lived in liberal cities my whole life.

No one's ever gone broke overestimating the almost sexual desire of white liberals to roll around in their white liberal guild and then savvy's $5,000 dinner.

I'm guarantee that.

Bye, ladies, that was really hard.

Next week, it's Eat Love Prey at Dana's house.

It's just, it's

nothing is happening.

So

I salute the hustle of the entrepreneurs.

Let me say this.

I don't know what these people are doing, but what I will say is this.

I think the the reason that people are getting fatigued with the diversity conversation is because we've been having it for so long.

And what I, look, I think some people may need to have that conversation, but what I would say is this,

where do we get to the buddy part of the buddy movie?

You know, the buddy movie is you got the black guy and the white guy, and they don't get along, and they argue, and they fuss, and they fight.

But then at a certain point, they realize they have shared humanity, and they do something awesome together.

When do we get to the awesome part?

I get it.

We fuss and fight, we don't get along.

But at a certain point, when do we say, let's put up solar panels in every poor community?

At what point do we say, let's educate 100,000 young kids to join the technology?

When do we get to the buddy part?

I think I think we can get a lot of people.

Not after this dinner.

Not after this dinner.

Not after this dinner.

No, but I think the white women

will be closer.

The white women will be closer.

They've endured something, so they've got their buddies now.

But I really am strong about this.

The buddy part is when we as a Democrats stop sending Chuck Schumer around to tell all these white working class people that we still hate you,

and we say these are people too, these are Americans, they need all these things, and we shouldn't revile them all the time.

I've never seen Chuck Schumer.

Yeah, I didn't see Chuck.

No, listen, Chuck Schumer said in 2016, you don't remember when he said, one,

I don't care if we lose, for every one working class white voter that we lose in Pennsylvania and Ohio and Michigan, we're going to get two college-educated Republicans.

In the first place, it didn't work out, And the message was clear.

He doesn't want white working class people in the party.

I see it differently.

Yeah,

I see it differently.

Listen, I loved the coalition that we put together in 2016 because it had people in there who had been left out for a long time.

It had Muslims.

It had gays and lesbians.

It had immigrants.

It had black moms who had lost people.

I love that circle.

I just think we drew the circle a little bit too small.

And there were people who were hurting who were outside of that circle, who are working class white folks and others who didn't, who we just didn't draw the circle big enough.

So I don't ever want to put down the black and brown folks who are suffering.

I don't want to put down the women.

I just want to bring in more folks.

How do we bring in the white working class?

And I think first of all,

I do think that we've got to rebalance

some of the cultural stuff, it just doesn't resonate outside the blue cities, and we need to be able to do it.

But I think we got to be careful because if we come across like we don't get the pain of the folks we just brought in that doesn't work either right and you know there's also a black working class yes a very large one they never use that term that work every day

people who take the showers before before breakfast after lunch anyway well very entertaining you two thank you very much but it's time for new rules new rules everybody

don't forget to enjoy autumn before it's gone.

Now, if you live on the East Coast, take in the changing leaves.

Here in the West, enjoy how fire season rolls right into award season.

And if you're in Russia and you're throwing someone out of a window, remember to say, have a nice fall.

New rural creepy old guys in dragon shows have to stop taking business meetings during doctor's appointments.

I've never seen a dragon show where an old guy didn't eventually have a scene where people people try to talk to him while doctors put leeches on his dick.

Come on, man, you're the king.

Put the maggots on your dick when it's convenient for you.

Everybody else can reschedule.

New rule.

Since there's a breed of Spaniel named King Charles, and now also a monarch named King Charles, let's not get the two confused.

One has enormous ears and is the result of inbreeding.

New Roll, now that there are two docuseries on TV about cannibals, one about a spoiled Hollywood wannabe cannibal and one about a working-class kid from Milwaukee who actually ate people, everyone must admit it says a lot about the kind of person you are by which one of these you watch.

Sorry, Army Hammer, but talking about eating people and actually doing it are two different things.

Call me when the cops find an arm in your fridge.

New world, if you want me to vote for your proposition, you can't just put an Indian in a field and say yes on 27.

You have to tell me what it's about.

I feel like a kid watching ads for tampons.

I know they let you swim and ride horses, but I don't know what they do.

And finally, new rule, now that Americans are finally returning to the office after the pandemic, let's let them fuck.

Not necessarily right on the copy machine, but you know, in general.

I bring this up because last week the Boston Celtics became the latest corporation to show an executive the door for what seems to be acknowledged as a consensual relationship when they suspended their head coach Imei Udoka.

Now, for sure, not all the facts about this case are known.

And if it turns out he was violent or physically coercive, then his case has nothing to do with what I'm about to say and he should expect the appropriate and severe punishment.

But in general, it's long overdue that America had an adult review of our war war on office romance.

You know, there's only a few places where Americans meet each other in person anymore.

Work, bars, church, and Adam Levine's hound.

Now in the Udoka case, the widely reported description of it has been improper, intimate, and consensual.

Okay, intimate and consensual, I shouldn't even be reading reading about it.

What people do that is intimate and consensual is not my business, not yours, and not that fucking little leprechaun.

Improper, on the other hand, probably refers to a power imbalance between the two parties.

And yes, in a workplace setting, a power imbalance can be abused and is a real thing to watch out for if it involves coercion or promoting someone who doesn't deserve it because they're blowing you.

But to deny two humans who are anxious for each other the chance to find love in the same office is a bit anachronistic.

as most businesses now have serious protocols in place where employees can report and get relief from being harassed.

This is no longer the madmen days where there was no HR, no yearly mandatory sexual harassment seminars, and the Me Too movement hadn't happened.

Times have changed.

And yet nearly a quarter of employers require all employee relationships of any kind to be disclosed.

Really?

God forbid grown-ups start making decisions about their own bodies without getting corporate involved.

And when it comes to managers and subordinates, the majority of companies don't allow any relationship at all.

But love and where it might happen is like the last mystery.

It's serendipity.

Also, when you're fucking someone at the office, you know they can hold down a job.

Under current guidelines, Michelle Robinson could never have dated Barack Obama, who was a summer associate at her law firm when they met.

She was literally fucking the intern.

Wasn't there a power imbalance when Joe Scarborough started dating Mika Brzezinski?

I'd have to say yes, since the name of the show was Morning Joe.

Not Morning Joe and Mika, although now that they're married, I wouldn't be surprised if that's next.

In 2019, the CEO of McDonald's had to step down after it was discovered that he was having a consensual relationship with an employee.

I know, gross, who would date someone who works at McDonald's?

But I remember reading about the scandal and wondering where the scandal was.

There was no harassment, no off-color text, no dick rubbing against underlings.

I mean, we all know that no doesn't mean yes, but now yes doesn't mean yes.

What happened to my body, my choice?

Same thing happened to the CEO of Priceline, forced out because he had a relationship with an employee.

But come on, it's hard not to have an affair or two when you're getting such a bargain on hotel rooms.

But this is how sex works now.

The rule is, if I want to have sex with another willing adult, but we both work for Hyundai, we need permission from Hyundai.

And we just accept that, like taking our shoes off at the airport.

Earlier this year, Jeff Zucker was forced to resign as president of CNN after he admitted he kills hookers in a van.

Oh, wait, no, that's not what happened.

I'm sorry, no.

He had consensual sex with a 49-year-old CNN executive who didn't complain then and doesn't now.

She said they were in a relationship.

Sure.

Like a 49-year-old executive knows better than we do about whether or not she's a victim.

Who are we protecting here?

Exactly who at CNN would have been traumatized by this unauthorized boning, the war correspondence?

This couple has been in the news a lot lately.

Why aren't we freaking out about a director dating one of her cast members?

Power imbalance?

Are you kidding?

On a movie set?

The director is God.

But sometimes people fall in love with God.

It's a very attractive position.

Who are we to tell other people they can't have love because when they met, they weren't exactly co-equal.

People are not always attracted to their co-equal.

We're not robots.

What we are apparently is lonely.

There is a loneliness epidemic out there.

It is widely reported.

A morning consult poll found that almost four out of five young adults consider themselves lonely and have trouble forming relationships outside of their home.

And that certainly seems the case in the incest porn I watch.

If loneliness is destroying our health, causing depression, anxiety, low self-esteem, and shortened life expectancy, it's just not helpful to be criminalizing the pool of eligible mates that is the workplace.

Does anyone really think that swiping right on some rando because he has nice hair and he's posing in front of a dodge challenger is a better way to meet someone than at the office?

And not for nothing, when Udoka was fired, they replaced him with a guy who was once arrested on charges of domestic battery.

But it's okay because they didn't work together.

All right, that's our show.

I'll be at the Fox in Detroit, October 8th.

The Hulu Theater in New York, November 12th, and the annual New Year's Extravaganza in Maui on December 30th and New Year's Eve in Honolulu.

I want to thank Van Jones, Caitlin Flanagan, and Los Lee Ali Ninjad.

Thank you to YouTube and join us on Overtime.

Thank you.

Catch all new episodes of Real Time with Bill Maher every Friday night at 10.

Or watch him anytime on HBO On Demand.

For more information, log on to HBO.com.