BILL MAHER HAS a request for America: “Please Stop Apologizing.” In a New York Times op-ed bearing that title, HBO‘s politico-celebrity calls for an end to politicians’ insincere demands for apologies from those who have supposedly offended them — and to the equally insincere apologies they so often elicit. Exhibit A, according to Mr. Maher, is the recent flap over actor Robert De Niro’s quip — for which he subsequently apologized — that Americans might not be ready for a “white first lady.” 
 
 Mr. Maher wants “an amnesty — from the left and the right — on every made-up, fake, totally insincere, play-acted hurt, insult, slight and affront.” If you see or hear something offensive, he instructs, just change the channel. To Mr. Maher’s credit, he’s willing to apply his permissive rule consistently, to include conservatives such as Rush Limbaugh, who apologized, under pressure, for labeling a Georgetown law student a “slut” on his radio show. 
 
 Though his tone is light, the funnyman has a point — both about the way political parties exploit their opponents’ impolite or, sometimes, merely impolitic comments, and about the fact that the Constitution protects offensive speech. Long before Harry Truman articulated it, one of the cardinal rules of American-style democracy, was “If you can’t stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen.” Phony umbrage is an old and increasingly tired pose. 
 
 Mr. Maher is a strange one to make this argument, though, since it is so obviously self-serving. Though his article does not say so, he too is under fire for, among many other things, using vile words to refer to former Alaska governor Sarah Palin and calling her family “inbred weirdos.” 
 
 This is rhetoric that goes beyond ridiculing or satirizing political adversaries to dehumanizing them. It encourages Americans to hate one another; or, at best, to tune one another out, as Mr. Maher recommends. He and Mr. Limbaugh both have a constitutional right to express themselves. But there are Americans who sincerely hope for civil discourse — for a nation where not every opponent is seen as an enemy. And they have a right to draw distinctions between the merely risque and the corrosively hateful, and to wish for higher standards, even from those who straddle the divide between politics and entertainment. 
 
 Incivility, like any other issue, is subject to partisan manipulation. But that doesn’t make it a phony issue. On this matter, we’d rather heed the words of the president whose reelection Mr. Maher recently backed with a $1 million “super PAC” donation. 
 
 “I am my brother’s keeper, I am my sister’s keeper,” then-Illinois State Sen. Barack Obama told the Democratic National Convention in 2004. “Now, even as we speak, there are those who are preparing to divide us — the spin masters, the negative ad peddlers who embrace the politics of ‘anything goes.’ Well, I say to them tonight, there is not a liberal America and a conservative America — there is the United States of America.” ||||| Bill Maher has opinions on the situation in the Gaza Strip and they are loaded with sexist bullshit for some reason. 
 
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 On Thursday, thousands of Israeli troops stormed into the region, leaving behind dozens of civilian casualties in their wake. On Wednesday, four children were killed by an Israeli missile. 
 
 Thursday evening, responding to the conflict in the region, Maher, the host of HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher and a comedian known for his outspoken stance on a variety of political and social issues (who also hosted a show called Politically Incorrect) tweeted this: 
 
 Maher is completely entitled to his opinion about the situation in that region. Agree with his stance or disagree, but no one, certainly not me is here to tell him he doesn't have a right to take a stance. 
 
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 But 'crazy woman'? Dude. First of all, that's an unoriginal joke that stopped being funny in 1993. Secondly, "crazy woman" is a loaded term with a fuckton of implications for women. Making a joke about hitting a woman to make a point about a country where people are being killed is just gross. It's not just PC whining, OK? If you really want people to take your opinions about issues that are important to you seriously (as Gaza clearly is to him), how about taking a moment to extend the courtesy to other people and do the same for issues that are important to them? That's what I don't get in situations like this. If you want to be taken seriously as a political pundit, how can you be so dismissive in the language you use when referring to women or other marginalized groups? 
 
 But I guess it's not about that. It's "what shocking thing can I say at a time like this to ruffle the most feathers?" This is the second time today we've seen a celebrity use Twitter to make a completely inappropriate "comedic" tweet about a horrible international news story. 
 
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 People on Twitter of course had immediate reactions to his choice of words. Some took issue and some showed support from him against the "PC police," which in case anyone needs a reminder is not a real goddamn thing. As my good buddy Jamie Kilstein once put it, "the PC police aren't real. You're not going to go to jail. You're just an asshole." 
 
 Amen, sister. 
 
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– Bill Maher is right to call for an end to political groups' "phony umbrage" at every potentially offensive remark. But the comedian's argument is "obviously self-serving," write the editors of the Washington Post. They note that in his New York Times editorial, Maher didn't mention the furor over his own comments—calling Sarah Palin a "vile" name and her family "inbred weirdos," for instance. "This is rhetoric that goes beyond ridiculing or satirizing political adversaries to dehumanizing them." Yes, Maher and Rush Limbaugh deserve the right to free speech, but some of us are looking for a conversation in which "not every opponent is seen as an enemy." Language like theirs prompts us to despise or just ignore each other. Yes, "incivility is subject to partisan manipulation. But that doesn’t make it a phony issue," the editors write. There's a difference between "the merely risque and the corrosively hateful"—one that even those who occupy the dual worlds of politics and entertainment should observe. Click through for the full editorial.