Bill Maher: Stop Saying Sex Addiction Like It's a Bad Thing

Bill Maher: Stop Saying Sex Addiction Like It's a Bad Thing
By Bill Maher, AlterNet
March 1, 2010

New Rule: Stop saying "sex addict" like it's bad thing. In the wake of Tiger Woods' heartfelt apology that he gave to his fans, his friends, his foundation - and just to be safe, Elizabeth Edwards - the media has been interviewing sex addicts: on CNN one addict said, "The day Mount Saint Helens blew up, everyone was talking about it. But I didn't even know it happened because I was having sex all that day." Oh, the humanity! Please get this man some professional help soon, before he has a hot three-way and completely misses a tornado.

Now, I haven't commented on Tiger Woods much because, well, he's just a golfer and it took me this long to give a shit. But all this talk about sex addiction now - please - sex addiction is just something Dr. Drew made up because he had no other way to explain Andy Dick. And that's not just me saying that - it's also the American Psychiatric Association, which does not list sex addiction in its manual; it does not regard it as a real psychological syndrome, like delirium or bipolar disorder or any of the other things Glenn Beck suffers from.

You want to know the surest way that you can spot a "sex addict?" He's got a penis. That's why Tiger was having sex with more women than even a black celebrity needs to have sex with, and thereby threatening to unbalance the delicate ecosystem of playas and ho's.

But before Tiger moves on there's one more apology he really should make, and that's to Buddha, for dragging him into this mess and proving once again, that whenever something unspeakably tawdry, loathsome and cheap happens, just wait a few days. Religion will make it worse.

Now usually, when famous cheaters are looking for public redemption, they go to Jesus, but Tiger went old school, and claimed that sleeping with 2/3 of the waitresses in America had made him a failure as a Buddhist. He said Buddhism teaches you the way to inner peace is letting go of desire - and if that doesn't sound like marriage, I don't know what does.

Personally, if I was a golfer, I'd go with Jesus - because he's a Trinity, so when you walk with him, you've got a foursome. Christianity is for rubes. Buddhism is for actors.

And it really is outdated in some ways - the "Life sucks, and then you die" philosophy was useful when Buddha came up with it around 500 B.C., because back then life pretty much sucked, and then you died - but now we have medicine, and plenty of food, and iPhones, and James Cameron movies - our life isn't all about suffering anymore. And when we do suffer, instead of accepting it we try to alleviate it.

Tiger said, "Buddhism teaches that a craving for things outside ourselves" makes us unhappy, which confirms something I've long suspected about Eastern religions: they're a crock, too.

Craving for things outside ourselves is what makes life life - I don't want to learn to not want, that's what people in prison have to do. Buddhism teaches suffering is inevitable. The only thing that's inevitable is that if you have fake boobs and hair extensions, Tiger Woods will try to fuck you.

And reincarnation? Really? If that were real, wouldn't there be some proof by now? A raccoon spelling out in acorns, "My name is Herb Zoller and I'm an accountant." ...something?

People are always debating, is Buddhism a religion or a philosophy: it's a religion. You're a religion if you do something as weird as when the Buddhist monks scrutinize two-year-olds to find the reincarnation of the dude who just died, and then choose one of the toddlers as the sacred Lama: "His poop is royal!" Sorry, but thinking you can look at a babbling, barely-housebroken, uneducated being and say, "That's our leader" doesn't make you enlightened. It makes you a Sarah Palin supporter.