Bill Maher says Trump is right in calling coronavirus 'Chinese virus': 'Eating bats is bats*** crazy'
HBO's 'Real Time' host Bill Maher doesn't see what the fuss is all about with calling coronavirus the "Chinese virus" or the "Wuhan virus," something that President Donald Trump has been chastized several times for as critics of the labels called the terms "racist" and "xenophobic," adding that making them a common usage could incite hate crimes against Asian-Americans.
In his bid to insist that using phrases like "Chinese virus" or the "Wuhan virus" was not unusual and hence should not be forbidden, Maher listed off several other illnesses that are named after their locations of origin, such as the West Nile virus, Spanish flu and MERS (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome). "You can't yell at someone for breaking a rule you just made up," he said during a segment on his show on Friday, April 10, Fox News reported, adding, "So why should China get a pass?"
He also went after Rep. Ted Lieu, (D-CA), who had condemned the term "Wuhan virus" by saying that it "is not constrained by country or race. Be just as stupid to call it the Milan Virus."
"No, that would be way stupider because it didn't come from Milan. And if it did, I guarantee we'd be calling it the Milan Virus. Jesus F***ing Christ, can't we even have a pandemic without getting offended?" Maher said. "Seriously, it scares me that there are people out there who would rather die from the virus than call it by the wrong name. This isn't about vilifying a culture, this is about facts. This is about life and death."
Maher also blasted the "PC police" for saying it was "racist" to attack another nation's cultural practice, such as the consumption of wild, exotic meat that is sold in the wet markets in China.
"It's not racist to point out that eating bats is bats*** crazy," Maher exclaimed, citing experts including Trump's coronavirus task force's Dr Anthony Fauci who has advocated against the wet markets.
"So when someone says, 'What if people hear Chinese Virus and blame China?' the answer is, 'We should blame China.' Not Chinese-Americans, but we can't stop telling the truth because racists get the wrong idea. There's always going to be idiots out there who want to indulge their prejudices, but this is an emergency! Don't we have bigger tainted fish to fry?"
He added: "Sorry Americans, we're going to have to ask you to keep two ideas in your head at the same time: This has nothing to do with Asian-Americans and it has everything to do with China. We can't afford the luxury anymore of non-judginess (sic) towards a country with habits that kill millions of people everywhere. Because this isn't the first time. SARS came from China. And the bird flu. And the Hong Kong flu. The Asian flu. Viruses come from China just like shortstops come from the Dominican Republic. If they were selling nuclear suitcases at these wet markets, would we be so non-judgmental?"
Maher further pined that "we'd be at war" if China had used the virus as a bioweapon against the US.
"This is a dictatorship that for decades enforced a one-child-per-family policy under penalty of forced sterilization, but you can't close down the Farmer's Market from Hell?" the show host said. "Maybe to use that iron fist and pound it down like the whole world depends on it because it kind of does. And I hope that if someone told Americans that eating Hot Pockets could cause a worldwide pandemic we would have the good sense of stop doing it. Although I wouldn't bet on it."