Aired August 13th, 1997
Guests on this program were:
G. Gordon Liddy
Marilyn Manson
Florence Henderson
Lakita Garth
[ Cheers and applause ]
Bill: Well, thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen. Well, thank you very much for that spontaneous outburst.
[ Laughter ]
I tell you, this U.P.S. strike is getting ugly. Have you been following this? Have you been waiting for a package?
[ Laughter ]
It's getting -- but there is a good side to it. Over at the Home Shopping Channel, the stuff is so backed up that their crap is coming back into style.
[ Laughter ]
Yes, and President Clinton has a new fund-raising problem. Boy, the committee isn't even in session, and they have problems with this. Apparently, an Oklahoma Indian tribe was at the White House giving their last dime to him. They gave $100,000 in the hope that land that they gave up like 100 years ago would be receded back to them. And not only that, the real incriminating thing for Clinton is that the Indians kept calling him by his Indian name, "Poke-A- Hot-Ass."
[ Laughter and applause ]
I kid the President.
From across the ocean, interesting news. I thought this is a sign of the times. London says they have absolutely run out of cemetery space. You can't die there anymore.
[ Laughter ]
They have not room for one more corpse, which apparently is why Rod Stewart is always on tour.
[ Laughter ]
Kidding. I kid Rod Stewart.
Also in London -- this is the talk of the British Airwaves now. Apparently, Lady Di has a new boyfriend. Have you seen this? He is an Arab playboy named Dodi Fayed. And apparently, they say, the press over there says he is helping her overcome her repressed sexuality. Or, as they say in London, getting in touch with your inner Fergie.
[ Laughter and applause ]
All right, thanks for coming. It's all been satirized for your protection.
[ Cheers and applause ]
Bill: All right. Welcome to the show. Let's meet our panel. She is an entertainer, activist, and a former Miss Black California. Her forthcoming rap CD is called Lakita. Lakita Garth.
[ Applause ]
Hello, beautiful.
Lakita: Hi. Nice to see you again.
Bill: Thank you so much. Nice to see you.
Star of stage, screen and television, she's known worldwide as Mrs. Carol Brady. The very Brady Florence Henderson!
[ Cheers and applause ]
Hello, Mrs. Brady. Good to see you. Thank you very much.
[ Applause ]
Author, actor, plumber and talk-radio host. No one else is quite, G. Gordon Liddy.
[ Cheers and applause ]
Gordon, good to see you. Thank you.
[ Applause ]
And he is the rock music phenomenon who the governor of Oklahoma calls "Proof that society's moral values continue to crumble." A huge CD hit... by the way, this is a great album, Antichrist Superstar." Marilyn Manson.
[ Cheers and applause ]
Hi, man. Thank you. Okay.
[ Applause ]
All right. I'm glad you're all here. We have, of course, a very controversial figure here -- Mrs. Brady.
[ Laughter ]
Florence: Look out.
Gordon: I want to protest something.
Bill: You want to protest already? I haven't even asked a question.
Gordon: I know it, but I want to protest something. I have seen the promotional material for this show. Here, you got a guy who, as far as I know, has never even been busted for being -- you know, impersonating a human being or anything. And I have got nine felonies for which I am totally unrepellant, and he is supposed to be the bad guy. Now what's going on? Where are standards in this country?
Bill: That's a good point. You have been to prison. They have tried to arrest you, but they haven't succeeded.
Marilyn: Right.
Bill: Right.
Marilyn: It's the lipstick. If we put some lipstick on him, I think everything will change.
[ Laughter ]
[ Applause ]
Bill: I'd like to see you try.
[ Laughter ]
Don't Christian groups need somebody to protest against? Isn't there a symbiotic relationship between whoever they're against, be it you or the gays or whatever... abortion clinics. Don't they need each other?
Florence: Or Kathie Lee gifford?
[ Laughter ]
Marilyn: There's an old saying that the devil has always been the church's best friend, because he's kept them in business. And I think, like you're saying, they picked me to be that, but I think -- I don't mind the protesting. I just wish that they would get the facts straight, because they think that I do a lot of things, but I am really about individuality. And that's really the bottom line.
Lakita: I think you guys have it totally backwards. You are just -- you guys have it totally backward. You're saying that the church needs people like Marilyn and other people to stay in business when actually Marilyn wouldn't even exist --
Bill: Manson.
Lakita: Well, Brian, if we really want to get real here, because that's his real name. That's what his mama named him. But the point is, is that --
[ Audience stirs ]
Bill: Oh, do you call him Cassius Clay, too?
[ Laughter ]
[ Applause ]
Lakita: But you know what? Even the name of his album, Antichrist Superstar, if there was no Christ, there -- you know, he's -- Christ is -- he needs Christ to stay in business. Because if he's trying to push the envelope, against whom? And that's the whole point. I think that when people are talking about the --
Bill: But Christ is really a metaphor here.
Lakita: Yeah, but they show up at these concerts and they protest. I think it's a sad commentary when we have put it on the slate that only the Christian right thinks that there's something wrong here. I don't know.
Bill: Now, there are rumors about what you do. And then there's the reality of what you do. There is, for example... you do rip pages out of the Bible in your concert. You do wipe your ass with the American flag.
Marilyn: Mm-hmm.
Bill: Some of these things, you have to admit, are controversial.
Marilyn: Absolutely. They're designed to make people think. But the point with the Bible or a flag is to say, "It's only as valid as you make it in your heart."
Florence: It's all about perception, isn't it, Marilyn?
Bill: Manson!
Marilyn: A piece of paper or a piece of cloth doesn't mean anything. It's what you believe. And I want people to think about what they believe. I want them to consider if everything they've been taught... if that's what they want to believe or if that's what they've been told that they have to believe.
Lakita: I agree with that.
[ Applause ]
I do agree with that point, in the sense of this -- I have more respect... and some people, you hear me out when you hear this. I have more respect for this young man than I have for the majority of people in this country, because 86% of Americans claim to be Christian, Judeo- Christian, whatever else, and they're not. They're hypocrites. But the point is, is that when I see this young man, you know, it does draw a line in the standard. We need to realize we are in a cultural war and everyone wants to straddle the fence. Either you are Anti-Christ or you are Christ. It's as simple as that.
Bill: Don't you think all of us have both in us?
Lakita: I don't. No, I don't. I don't wipe my rear end with the American flag. And, you know, I don't --
Bill: But you don't have evil --
Lakita: I don't see that giving somebody oral sex on stage --
Florence: Have been to this show? I haven't seen that.
[ Laughter and applause ]
Bill: I gotta take a break. We'll come back to this.
[ Applause ]
[ Applause ]
Bill: Okay. Some of us are old enough to remember what a rock band had to do in former days to upset parents. And it really wasn't very much, right? I mean, the Beatles, when they first came out, had long hair. It wasn't really much longer than yours, Gordon.
[ Laughter ]
I'm not kidding. It was not long hair, and they were apoplectic --
Florence: You know, talking about that and how people look and their perception and the way people look at you and go, "My God." But you know what? I look back --
[ Laughter ]
Seriously, I look back at the early Brady Bunch days. I looked like the Anti-Christ.
[ Laughter ]
With that hair and the skirt and the platforms, right?
Bill: We went through some of the things over the course of time. Now, in 1956, when Elvis went on Ed Sullivan, they wouldn't show him below the waist. Do you know this? I mean, this was history.
Gordon: Yeah, I remember it.
Bill: Because that would upset, I guess, America. In 1967, Mick Jagger went on with the Rolling Stones, Ed Sullivan, couldn't sing the lyrics "Let's spend the night together." He had to change it to "Let's spend some time together." And I think, along the way, if you put what the rock groups were prohibited from doing with what kids were doing, there is a difference. I mean, in 1956, when that was what pushed the envelope, the troubles in the school were chewing gum and patent-leather shoes that could see up a skirt. Today, they're throwing babies out with the bath water, literally. Now, isn't there a connection there?
Marilyn: Well, I think if parents spent more time trying to censor rock music and art and movies and things like that, and they spent the time teaching their kids to appreciate and understand those things, and to know what's right and what's wrong, I think that's more time spent more valuable.
Lakita: It's less about Marilyn, but more about the hundreds of thousands of young people. What motivates them to go out, and not just him, but you know, Ozzy Osbourne in the '70s. He was real big. What motivates them to go out and buy, a so-called "Demon-possessed" young man's album?
Florence: But Lakita, more importantly, what possesses him to go out on stage?
Lakita: No, no, no, no, no. But see, that's the whole thing. If there were no crowd, if there was no market, you know, he would be out of business. If there weren't people buying his records and making it platinum --
Gordon: Let me cut to the chase here.
Bill: Gordon wants to break in, so to speak.
[ Laughter ]
[ Applause ]
Florence: Ohh, Bill.
[ Applause ]
Gordon: The drift of this conversation seems to be, at least what I seem to get from you, is the question -- is Manson and others... are they responsible for the kind of society we have today? And I think that that is absolutely backwards. We have a society today with totally without reference to Manson here, in which it is perfectly permitted, and it happens thousands of times throughout the year, when they take a viable baby from a mother, all the way except to the top of the head, shove a scissors through the base of its skull and suck out its brains, and you're complaining about him?
Bill: I'm not complaining about him. I like him.
Marilyn: Well, also think about this. If you want to blame rock music for things, think about what the Bible has done. What about Heaven's Gate or Jim Jones or the Ku Klux Klan? What they do in the name of Christ.
Lakita: They totally defy the Bible. The Bible says, if you love God and hate your brother, you are a liar, and God is not in you. Obviously, you have not read that. Because any Klansman --
Marilyn: No, I've read the Bible. I'm just saying what people do in the name of the Bible.
Lakita: Any Klansman who tries to recite the Bible is a liar, and God isn't in him. So, if we're gonna quote the Bible -- you complain that people take you out of context. Don't take the Bible out of context.
[ Applause ]
The majority of people --
Marilyn: I am saying --
Gordon: He is not taking the Bible out of context. He is taking Friedrich Nietzsche out of context. That's what he doing.
[ Laughter and applause ]
Bill: But the Bible certainly has been the inspiration for an amazing amount of unbible-like activity.
Marilyn: That's what I'm saying.
Florence: Absolutely.
Lakita: And there has been more unbible-like activity -- look at our century. Look at the 20th Century. You know, all the mass murders and killings and more people have been murdered outside of the name of religion than have been in the name of religion in this century. That was just in The New York Times a year ago.
Bill: And that's your big claim to fame?
[ Laughter ]
Lakita: No, it's not. But why does everybody want to put the tag on, you know, "Oh, the Bible is evil," or "We need to question" --
Marilyn: No, I'm not saying that. I like the Bible. I'm just saying I don't like the way people misuse it. Just as much as people could misuse music.
Lakita: Then if you like it, then be the standard and do it. That's the problem.
Marilyn: I like it as a book. Just like I like The Cat In The Hat.
[ Laughter ]
[ Applause ]
Lakita: People say they're something and they're not.
Bill: All right, I gotta break. Lakita, I'm sorry.
[ Applause ]
[ Applause ]
Bill: Okay. Now, turnabout is fair play. We've been talking about Marilyn Manson and his responsibility to society and so forth. Now, you also have a record out. And I have the lyrics to one of your songs, which I think is more irresponsible than anything on one of his records.
Lakita: Well, shoot. Go ahead.
Bill: Yes. It talks about condoms. And it says -- "Like the condoms we sell 'em, but we won't tell 'em it ain't safe even if you got 'em." So you're telling kids --
Lakita: That's not what it says.
Bill: That's what the lyric says. "Don't you know they got holes" --
Lakita: I don't think you listen --
Bill: It says -- "Don't you know they got holes you can't see. They might stop a baby but it hardly stops VD."
Lakita: That's right. That is correct.
Bill: That's not correct.
Lakita: That is correct. You need to do your homework. You check the centers for disease control.
[ Audience oohs ]
Bill: You're telling --
Lakita: When I testified before the Senate in Washington, D.C. --
Bill: Were they there?
Lakita: The surgeon general, when I testified, it was true. Condoms were never designed to prevent people from getting anything except for pregnant. We encourage people to use them to stop STDs. There are at least over 50 STDs, counting all the different strains that are out there. 20 of them... at least 20 of them a condom really can't help you with. Condoms don't care.
Bill: How can it stop what stops pregnancy without stopping everything else?
Lakita: Because the HIV virus is about 450 times smaller than a sperm cell. And if you magnify that -- and if you magnify that, that's about the size of a football field, would be the size of one sperm cell.
Bill: So what you're telling horny teenagers that the only thing you can do is be abstinent, and condoms don't work. So kids are not going to use condoms because they're going to listen to you and figure, "Well, why should we even use condoms?" And that to me is irresponsible.
Marilyn: No sex equals violence.
Bill: No sex equals violence?
Gordon: You're making an irresponsible impression --
Marilyn: It's suppression of sex throughout history that's made people so violent, I think.
Lakita: That is the stupidest thing I have ever heard of.
[ Laughter ]
Marilyn: If you're feeling guilty about having sex --
Lakita: I have never known anyone --
Marilyn: Everybody wants to have sex. The world was created through sex.
Lakita: Yes, this is true.
Gordon: The irresponsible assumption is -- the one that you made is that teenage children are going to have sex no matter what. That's not necessarily true at all.
Lakita: No, it's not.
Bill: Oh, Gordon.
[ Laughter ]
Lakita: It's not.
Gordon: I had a lot of teenage companions when I was a teenager, and they were not running around getting laid.
Marilyn: But he was also in prison, so he's got a different --
[ Laughter ]
Different outlook.
Gordon: But I wasn't as good-looking as you are.
[ Laughter ]
Lakita: As far as being responsible, I take full responsibility for every word that I speak when I go out and speak to thousands of young people. And on top of that, I'm encouraging them to do something that is good.
Florence: And you certainly know how to speak, Lakita. Let me tell you that!
Lakita: Well, thank you. Thank you.
Marilyn: Let me ask you this. If I don't get laid, can I sue her, because of her lyrics?
[ Laughter ]
[ Applause ]
Lakita: No, because I don't have anything. I don't have anything to give. But I would invite you to come out and hang with me and some of my friends sometime.
Marilyn: We can do a show together.
Lakita: I'd like to.
Marilyn: I'm open-minded. I don't protest Sunday schools or anything.
Lakita: I would love to have dinner and just shoot the breeze with you.
Bill: And then you could be with Ted Kennedy one night.
[ Laughter ]
[ Applause ]
I'm sorry.
Florence: Aren't you hoping that your CD makes a lot of money just like Marilyn hopes that he does? Isn't that what it's about?
Lakita: No, it's not. Because I turned down more jobs than I have ever worked, because of... I will not expose my body or I won't use foul language or I won't spread my legs for just any old Joe that comes around. I have a standard that I live up to. And, you know, I'm very frank, up front. I'm very honest about what I believe.
Florence: I hope that you will always be able to live like that.
Lakita: Well, you know what? I think we should encourage other young people to do that.
Florence: I hope you don't have many challenges in life.
Lakita: I have very many challenges in life.
Florence: Do you?
Lakita: Yes. And I would like for you to come to dinner with me and learn the challenges.
Marilyn: It's very admirable to be idealistic. You know, I want people to think, but I'm not trying to think I can save the world.
Lakita: You can't save the world because you're not Christ.
Marilyn: Maybe they only deserve to be entertained before they're all destroyed.
Bill: I couldn't agree more.
Florence: You can't judge who is Christ and who isn't. He may have more Christ in him than you do. You can't really say that.
[ Applause ]
Bill: And that's from Mrs. Brady! All right, we gotta take a break. We'll be right back.
[ Applause ]
[ Applause ]
Bill: Now, you were about to say, Marilyn Manson.
Marilyn: Yeah, just about perspectives. When we were talking about Christ and me being not like Christ. I mean, if you look at things from a different point of view, one person could see Christ as being someone a lot like me. Someone with long hair, had a lot of fans, a lot of people that followed. He had 12 disciples, that could have been his posse for all we know.
[ Laughter ]
He hung out with hookers. He drank. People were against him.
Lakita: But being like Christ is different than being Christ.
Bill: And they killed him.
Marilyn: And they killed him.
Lakita: But being like Christ is different than being Christ. I think you're not Christ. Just like you're not Hitler. You're not Genghis Khan.
Marilyn: I don't want to be Christ.
Lakita: And you're not anyone who has lived and who is no longer here on this planet. And so, you know, if we're going to look at what people say --
Marilyn: What about Elvis?
[ Laughter ]
Lakita: Definitely not Elvis. Because -- you don't swing your hips like he does.
Marilyn: You haven't seen me.
[ Laughter ]
Lakita: You'd be surprised what I have seen.
[ Applause ]
You'd be surprised at what I have seen.
Bill: Mrs. Brady, I think we've made a love connection.
Marilyn: I think it's on.
Florence: You know, we're going to the prom together.
[ Laughter ]
Lakita: This is what's interesting here. And this is something I have always wanted to ask you, Marilyn.
Bill: Manson!
Lakita: No, he's Brian, okay. Whatever. Since we're on national television, I want to ask you - what standards do you have and where do you draw the line as far as what is good and what is evil?
Marilyn: I have basic principles that kind of exist in all religions... even Christianity.
Lakita: Such as?
Marilyn: Well, the fundamentals. You know, you don't kill people. A basic good person.
Lakita: Okay. So --
Marilyn: Probably the same as yours.
Lakita: No, they're not the same.
[ Laughter ]
Guaranteed they're not the same. You are a minister of the church of satan.
Marilyn: I'm not a minister of anything.
Lakita: Okay. 'Cause I don't know, Rolling stone. I have heard that you were into the church of satan. I assume you read The Satanic Bible, by Anton LaVey.
Marilyn: I read both Bibles. I read the Christian Bible, too.
Lakita: Okay. Right. Okay, and we know that the Bible has ten commandments... not ten suggestions. And there is one commandment in the book of satan. What is that commandment?
Marilyn: I don't know. I don't preach either Bible.
Bill: "Kill Lakita Garth."
[ Laughter ]
Lakita: You don't? They would like to.
Marilyn: I mean, I follow basic principles like anybody else would.
Bill: What people forget, what people don't see is that when you're a 14-year-old or a 16-year- old, and you go to his concert, it enunciates what you're feeling. Do you remember what you felt like at that age? I do.
Gordon: Yeah, I want to bug my parents.
Lakita: I didn't.
Marilyn: Isolation.
Bill: Isolation, exactly.
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Politically Incorrect with Bill Maher
Executive Producers
Scott Carter
Bill Maher
Nancy Geller
Senior Producer
Douglas M. Wilson
Supervising Producer
Kevin E. Hamburger
Created By
Bill Maher
Directed By
Michael Dimich
Writing Supervised By
Chris Kelly
Writers
Dave Boone
Dave Drabik
Brian Jacobsmeyer
Bill Kelley
Bill Maher
Billy Martin
Ned Rice
Danny Vermont
Ron West
Scott Carter
Executive in Charge of Production
John Fisher
Executive Producers
Brad Grey
Bernie Brillstein
Marc Gurvitz
©1997 Brillstein-Grey Communications
