Maher's misleading corner

Since Bill Maher unexpectedly cornered Mona Eltahawy on his show I'd like to give my answer to his use of a Pew survey to explain the sentiments of Egyptians:

1) Surveys are a deceptive tool used by journalists and pundits to try to make sweeping generalizations about large groups of people based on misleading questions of a small sample of a population. They are junk science with little basis in truth. Since the members of the audience and viewers of Maher's show are supposed to be educated, he should consider not insulting their intelligence or his guests by claiming such surveys have any relevance to reality.

2) I wouldn't know if Egyptians support stoning adulterers because I've never had a conversation about the topic with one. The few thousands of Egyptians I've met from different classes and religions were interested in other matters in their lives like eating, working, taking care of their families and making jokes. The few people wielding rocks in the last weeks amid hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of peaceful protesters were doing so for protection from the police and state security while rising up for basic human rights and to create a democracy from the people. The Egyptians I know are too dedicated to leading dignified lives and dignified deaths to consider such medieval European ideas.

3) I wonder why a presenter would ask such questions. If it is to give the audience the impression that Egypt is a backwater ruled by barbarians, then he is reducing thousands of years of culture and civilization, discrediting the urbane nature of many Egyptians while ignoring that his own country was founded only two hundred years ago on the genocide of tens of millions of Native Americans, built on the backs of African slaves shipped to the New World as commodities, formed on the basis of economic disparities and still employs capital punishment with support from a large number of citizens. If his purpose is to insinuate that Arabs or Muslims are incompatible with human rights or democracy then maybe he should take a history lesson from a legitimate scholar who aim is not to denounce billions of people and their culture and beliefs. Or even better, maybe he should get up off his lazy white ass, spend a bit of his fat paycheck to meet these people face to face like human beings rather than condescendingly talk about them from the comfort of his elitist television studio.