American comedian Bill Maher insulted Pope Benedict XVI before his official visit to the United States, calling Catholicism a "cult" that promotes "organized pedophilia." The comments were made on HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher" on Friday, Apr. 11. Maher went into a long monologue on his program comparing the Catholic church to a polygamous cult -- the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints -- which was raided on Apr. 3 and whose founder, Warren Jeffs, was convicted last year for being an accessory to the rape of a teenage girl.
Many American catholics are enraged at Bill Maher's comments and religious organisations have urged HBO to deal with Maher. Apparently under some pressure, Bill Maher has agreed to apologise for the hurtful comments directed at the pope which are also factually wrong.
Bill Maher used freedom of expression to hurt the feelings of catholics who have applied commercial pressure on HBO. Since Bill Maher's HBO program ratings may drop due to boycott by catholics, Maher has quickly agreed to apologise to avoid any further damage.
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3 comments:
American catholics are enraged at Bill Maher's comments..... but they are not calling for his death..
People are so sensitive.... :S
hi dhivehi resisitence
American catholics are very angry and hurt by Bill Maher's comments.You are right, they are not calling for his death. Though they find Maher's remarks despicable, they accept his constitutional right to express them.
In this case, they have managed to stop Maher repeating the comments and won his public apology by threatening to boycott his programs.
This is a more tolerant way than burning effigies, disprupting trade or calling for violence and death.
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