Ricky Gervais Blasts Woke Fascism, Defends Conservatives and Free Speech
The left likes to claim that conservatives are fascists, but in reality, it’s liberals who have become the true fascists.
British comedian Ricky Gervais, who created and starred in the U.K. version of the hit television series “The Office” (the American adaption was loosely based on his show), is by no means on the political right, yet he nonetheless sees radical leftism for what it really is, and has repeatedly called the far left out over its anti-free speech agenda.
Gervais pointed out the fascistic nature of cancel culture during a recent interview on talkRadio, saying that “if you’re mildly conservative” on Twitter, people call you “Hitler.”
“There’s this new, weird sort of fascism of people thinking they know what you can say and what you can’t, and it’s a really weird thing that there’s this new trendy myth that people who want free speech want it to say awful things all the time. It just isn’t true, [free speech] protects everyone,” he said.
“And this new thing ‘hate speech’ — ‘oh, well that’s hate speech.’ And, well, the two catastrophic problems with the term ‘hate speech’ is one, what constitutes ‘hate speech’? Everyone disagrees. There’s no consensus on what ‘hate speech’ is,” Gervas added.
“And two, who decides? And there’s the real rub, because obviously the people who think they want to close down free speech because it’s bad are the fascists.”
Gervais continued, specifically calling out “social justice warriors.”
“These people hide behind this shield of goodness: ‘We’re good. We’re social justice warriors. We’re doing this for good and what we say goes.’ And they don’t realize how corrupt and wrong that is,” he said.
People get so entrenched in their views online that a slight lean toward either the left or the right immediately gets you labeled as some sort of extremist, Gervais added.
“If you’re mildly left wing on Twitter, you’re suddenly Trotsky,” he said. “If you’re mildly conservative, you’re Hitler, and if you’re centrist and you look at both arguments, you’re a coward and they both hate you.”
This is hardly the first time that the famous comedian has taken a stand for free speech.
“I think offense is the collateral damage of free speech, and it’s no reason not to have free speech,” he told The Hollywood Reporter for an interview published in January. “That’s what I’d say — it’s the lesser of two evils. Having free speech and some people getting upset by it is the lesser of two evils because not having free speech is horrendous.”
“People like the idea of freedom of speech until they hear something they don’t like,” he added.
“So there’s still a pressure, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to water it down or back down and not say what I want. It’s just another form of what we’ve been through many, many times — it used to be called P.C.”
The comedian has also made it a habit of calling out virtue-signaling celebrities.
While hosting the Golden Globe Awards ceremony earlier this year, Gervais famously made several jokes mocking Hollywood celebrities’ preening and lack of self awareness.
“So if you do win an award tonight, don’t use it as a platform to make a political speech,” he said. “You’re in no position to lecture the public about anything. You know nothing about the real world. Most of you spent less time in school than Greta Thunberg.
“So if you win, come up, accept your little award, thank your agent, and your God and f— off.”
In an April interview, Gervais slammed celebrities like Sam Smith and Ellen DeGeneres for complaining about how hard life is during the current health crisis.
“But then I see someone complaining about being in a mansion with a swimming pool. And, you know, honestly, I just don’t want to hear it,” he told the U.K. tabloid The Sun.
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