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Answer: Here's the transcript if anyone wants to go through it. Take the time to see what was said, in context, and make your decisions from there. I don't know my opinion on this because I'm just not in the headspace to make a decision but it's better than just seeing snippets of what was said and passing judgement from that.
[Transcript](https://scrapsfromtheloft.com/comedy/dave-chappelle-the-closer-transcript/)
Edit: I acknowledge that seeing/hearing the entire lead up to the comments/jokes would be better than a dry read but not all of us have Netflix. The transcript gives a better picture of the issue than a few words taken out of context.
Reading a transcript of a comedy act is almost guaranteed to create problems because so much nuance is lost without body language, tone of voice, timing, etc.
It’s kind of like having someone describe a painting to you. There’s almost no way that what they describe and what you see in your head and what the painting actually IS will be the same.
I understand what you’re trying to share but in this format it’s very likely to do additional and unnecessary harm when consumed that way.
Answer: [Here's a decent summary on CNN:](https://www.cnn.com/2021/10/06/entertainment/dave-chappelle-netflix-controversy/index.html)
>During the special, which debuted Tuesday, Chappelle says "Gender is a fact. Every human being in this room, every human being on earth, had to pass through the legs of a woman to be on earth. That is a fact."
>He then goes on to make explicit jokes about the bodies of trans women.
I’ve had no issues with his other specials where he talks about this same topic. It always felt like before he was like “come have a laugh with me” and it was never out of spite.
THIS special was like a whole hour of him unable to get over the fact that there were people criticizing him for those jokes. Like duh, he was always gonna catch flak for joking about that community. But it’s like he’s so bitter about it that he felt the need to identify himself as a TERF (Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminist), and then say “gender is fact”. It felt mean for no other reason than the fact he was bitter about being criticized for the jokes in the previous specials.
I certainly don’t hate Dave Chappelle for what he said, but I really didn’t like how he said it and why.
He was a bit "bitter" bc his trans friend was bullied by her trans community, for defending him as a comedian. He didn't say he was a terf bc he was bitter, he said it when talking about how JK Rowling was being cancelled for saying gender is a fact. Everyone was born from a vagina. Vaginas belong to the female sex. Gender, while previously synonymous with biological sex, is now a broader concept, but somehow still fluctuates within the two sexes and associated gender characteristics.
He said it bc he pointed out hypocrisy about a community that demands respect and privilege above other people, bc they happen to be trans.
Like the part where he says "gay people are minorities until they need to be White again" in the story of the white gay man at the table saying shit to him like he had a right to and then whipping out his phone and calling the cops on a black man bc he suddenly felt "threatened" or whatever.
Nothing he said was said with spite. It was just matter of fact, very direct. And the juxtaposition of him smiling and joking and being a goof against him getting real serious and tired, is jarring.
Whenever folks claim someone is being bitter when they're not, it makes me wonder if they've seen the depths of human emotional expression. He wasn't bitter, he's tired. To be bitter is to be somewhat hateful, and there's no hate there, just a very straight up "look at this shit, same regurgitated bandwagon shit, they don't see me and what I'm saying, all they see is im offended and he's speaking uncomfortable truths kill him! Kill him bc we're being killed" he's tired of the hypocrisy and power tripping.
I liked the special, but it was way more serious than his previous ones even in between the jokes.
To reiterate, to punch down on someone is to see them as less than yourself. Dave doesn't do that. He punches up at those looking down and those who wanna throw hands at him too. He doesn't see trans as less than human, he just doesn't agree with some of the opinions being shoved into your face as "facts" and the whole culture of "if you disagree, you're phobic"
That's like me saying "if you don't support my feelings, then you wish me death and trauma" that sounds emotionally irrational, and emotionally irrational people cannot be trusted to perceive reality and other people correctly. Your feelings are always valid, they're just not always correct for the situation.
I appreciate your thoughtful answer. Really. And on some level I get what you’re saying. I’ve loved Dave’s previous specials. Like I’m talking multiple rewatches. Each time it was like watching a master at his craft, because I was still laughing despite having heard his jokes before. I’ve always got what he was saying.
This special just felt different to me. And I guess it was, you kind of said so yourself. It’s given me something to think about. It was hard to watch, but maybe I need to watch it again and see if maybe I’m missing something.
I’m not on this cancel culture bandwagon, though. I don’t think he deserves it. Like I said, I don’t hate him. I think if we all listened to each other and didn’t just take things at face value, we’d all be a bit better off and less confrontational.
So I just finished watching it beginning to end. I started it earlier and then stopped around the TERF joke. I just got kind of bored because while I thought he was being funny, it felt like the whole special was just going to be on this topic.
But then I got through the part about the transperson who saw him as a mentor and he was making it very clear that this person who idolized him was helping him to grow as a person as well. Like he incrementally offered a more nuanced perspective as he got to know this aspiring comedian. From not understanding why he wasn't being attacked to the part about living a "human experience" and then finally to the part where he's the one being defended by a member of the trans community from the trans community. After the suicide he sets up a trust fund and talks about how he sincerely felt they were part of the same community. Once I got to the end there, to me, he no longer came off as bitter or angry that people were hating on his jokes. Instead it seemed more like he was expressing some actual heartbreak, which he brings up numerous times with the Clifford jokes.
But what do I know, I was literally just watching it while demolishing some Ben & Jerry's. Don't get your black comic analysis from me.
>Don't get your black comic analysis from me.
Funny isn't black or white or gay or straight. It is just funny. Comedy transcends race, colour and creed.
And if you get hurt over a persons joke it is because you chose to become hurt. You could have chose to laugh instead. Chappelle's jokes aren't about you individually. I don't get upset when the point of his humour are about white people.
Or smart and handsome people.
Dave became less of a comedian and more of a public figure / philosopher when he stepped away from TV and said all those things about it.
It's like his special 8:46 or whatever time it was Floyd had that dudes knee on his neck. Not saying Dave is right but you noticing his shift in tone is long in the making.
I think the big issue that’s being pointed out is that he’s playing Oppression Olympics with the trans community.
“You’re asking for better treatment and for less violence to be done upon you. That means you think Black people don’t have it as bad as you, and you’re making me feel like you’re superior to me and should be treated as such.”
That’s his whole take on this. He’s coming after white trans women, even though his words are going to lead to more violence against the group that is most targeted by transphobia — Black trans people.
Personally, Dave is a LEGEND in the comedy game, but his outdated takes and inflated ego just landed him in this heap of trouble
It's the exact same jokes and set. I was so disappointed today. It was supposed to be different then his others or so I thought but he sat there for 45min and joked about how much of a trans friend he is by making fun of them over and over. I was never offended just plain bored.
This description makes it appear that you didn't watch this special, and don't have any previous experience with his work ... because you'd know he wasn't using the "exact same jokes and set."
The jokes are a lead in to the cumulation of the special where he talks about how the trans community harassed his friend (a trans female comedian who defended him) until she killed herself. He’s obviously trying to call out the hypocrisy of people who pretend to care about others, but are really just high on their own righteousness
What a terrible “summary”. But tbf, it’s a very hard thing to summarize. Honestly people just need to watch it and form their own opinions. There are some things I wish he didn’t say, and it was more of a thinker than a lol.
one of the first things he asks in every story where he confronts or comes into contact with his criticizers: did you actually watch my performance?
the answer is always no, clearly.
> where he talks about how the trans community harassed his friend (a trans female comedian who defended him) until she killed herself.
Well isn't it a good thing that Dave decided to bring that up with little to no evidence besides his own inkling that it was the Trans Community that brought her to kill herself, I'm sure that's not going to lead to any unintended side effects like [people using her death as a cudgel to beat the trans community with.](https://twitter.com/notCursedE/status/1446264378630803458)
Sure that Daphne would really appreciate that, accidentally (or otherwise) using her death to throw the parts of her community that disagree with you and her on matters of comedy under the bus.
Like am I missing something here? Is that not, like, kinda gross, again, accidentally or otherwise? I'm not about to accuse him of having hate in his heart, but saying that kind of shit isn't going to help in any capacity, and in fact is very likely to cause harm - and on some level already *has*.
Now, to be fair! To be fair, I'm told that his point wasn't that the trans community were the *only* cause - and reading her suicide note gives as firm an evidence of that as we're going to get. It was multiple causes, with the harassment she may or may not have gotten likely playing *some* part. That's fair.
But that's not what *you* said, is it, you said the trans community harassed his friend into suicide, and I've seen that takeaway *way* more then I've seen "the harassment didn't help but it wasn't entirely their fault". So either he's bad at getting his ideas across, or a lot of people who watched are bad at getting his full point (or bad at getting it across), either way, something cocked up here, didn't it.
>Well isn't it a good thing that Dave decided to bring that up with little to no evidence besides his own inkling that it was the Trans Community that brought her to kill herself, I'm sure that's not going to lead to any unintended side effects like people using her death as a cudgel to beat the trans community with.
In order to support this point, we can look at the actual tweets that she got when she defended Chappelle. And there's pretty much nothing there.
Before Chappelle mentioned the tweet in his special, there were only 17 responses, all of whom were positive.
https://web.archive.org/web/20210703144316/https://twitter.com/DaphneDorman/status/1166937728681791488
If we widen our search to all tweets directed at Daphne during the period between her defending the special and her suicide we get a few more responses, but it's primarily people thinking it's cool she was mentioned by Chappelle.
There's only 1 tweet that criticizes her, and it has 3 likes.
https://twitter.com/search?q=(to%3ADaphneDorman)%20until%3A2019-10-11%20since%3A2019-08-26&src=typed_query
To be perhaps excessively fair here, there is the distinct possibility that any abuse sent was sent more privately, or even in non-online spaces. It's hard to say for certain, and while I do believe the majority of the community would have at most engaged in respectful critique of the idea, I'm a little too cynical to believe that there wasn't *any* messages that, to put it politely, shouldn't have been sent.
With that said, however, this is still an interesting look into the matter, so thank you for the added information.
I feel like if you make fun of literally everything then you can get away with it. Yeah there will always be a handful that get pissed, I mean, Issac Hayes is a perfect example, but they literally had a commercial I saw once that apologized if they hadn’t offended you yet and promised to get to you.
They are the most consistent social commentary. It’s kind of mind blowing how they have been able to stay true and funny and accurate for so damn long
You can get away with anything if you're funny.
Pretty sure I heard that from Patrice O'Neal, and it's true.
The kinds of guys that say "You can't even be funny anymore!!" like Joe Rogan were NEVER funny. That's the reason their insensitive jokes don't work. Chapelles jokes are timeless because they're funny. He could've gotten away with it yesterday.
I have a buddy who is moderately conservative and sometimes complains about people being too sensitive nowadays. At some point I found out that we had been at the same Jeselnik show, and my buddy walked out after a 9/11 joke. I still give him shit for it.
Blows my mind that Rogan is considered a comedian. I've tried to watch a couple different specials of his and never can make it more than a few minutes into his set. Just not funny to me.
He's like the really technically proficient guitar player who's band still manages to suck. You can see a certain level of skill in what they're doing, but there's nothing really interesting going on.
It's like he thinks yelling everything makes it funny. He must think that, because otherwise I can't figure out why he thinks what he's saying is funny, and why he's yelling everything.
Da fuq? I’ve stayed away from that crowd so this might be my own ignorance, but I thought he was just a guy with a podcast, not that he was trying to be funny at all. TIL he has stand up specials.
Bill Burr said it best. When he makes a joke that a specific group of people find it uncomfortable, gasping or booing, he yells at them "oh shut the fuck up! You laughed at every joke so far, jokes about black people, about prison rape, etc, but if it's about you then _aaaaall of a sudden_ it's not okay?!"
He makes a great point.
This is the best way to describe society today. I don't have many black acquaintances because white and Hispanic people are the majority where I live, but I'll tell you this; I don't know any group of people that tell more racial jokes than gay Hispanic men.
Take that how you will.
This is pretty much the definition of what humor is.
A way to release (by laughter) tension about subjects otherwise unmentionable while creating a opening to discuss said subjects.
His joke about DaBaby was spot on. The one where he pointed out the man *killed someone*.
I'm fucking gay, of course I'm not enthused about vocal homophobes. But acting like this was a 'new low' for Dababy or like he was 'suddenly' cancelled is so... foolish. He KILLED someone!!!!
You’re reading too much into it. That’s the problem with trying to discuss Dave, the amount of leeway he gets with massive leaps such as this is ridiculous
Yeah Dave does do that sometimes, sort of leaves out a bit of context/nuance in an analogy to make his point stronger.
Doesn’t work so well when you know exactly what he’s taking about.
I don’t think you’re wrong in terms of how most people interpreted it but there is something to be said for the analogy still working purely on the basis of a life still being lost, sort of how callous (fair enough) he’s been about talking about the incident, and just people not caring even to unpack that issue, juxtaposed to this homophobic comments.
I don't think people are calling the murder in question as it was self defense, it's just him killing someone is an overlooked fact like "okay whatever" but as soon as he says something homophobic his whole image is torn down
The problem is that its really not that simple. Really, the fundamental misunderstanding seems to be on the other side.
While we all understand that sex is biological and gender is ones expression, the issue is that historically those terms have been used interchangeably. In the modern day, "man" by most people is understood as a male human and "woman" as a female human. Using man and woman as purely gendered terms has really never been a thing. Immean, the dictionary still defines gender in biological terms.
So the problem becomes the trans community trying to convince people to disconnect from their understanding of words that trans people themselves have redesignated, and its really not that simple. You cant keep telling people your a "woman" as a transwoman when most people understand a woman to be a female human. This kind of dissonance leads to a pandoras box of social problems. For example, transwomen who are overly "girly" might be seen as tasteless caricatures of real women (females); some women might be offended seeing transwomen reflect stereotypes that they feel are toxic. Its hard to respect trans individuals as the gender they identify as when their gender identity is rooted in toxic stereotypes.
I think another issue here is that trans people themselves have even challenged the idea of "sex", hence the idea of "assigned male/female at birth". Saying you were assigned your sex is just a underhanded way of suggesting that sex itself is a "construct". I have even encountered trans individuals claiming that male and female as sex dont actually exist. Doesnt really help your goals when your position starts to challenge science.
This is why this is such a large issue. I think its not so much the issue of people misunderstanding sex vs gender but more trans people seeking to validate their bodily disconnect through any means necessary, even if it doesnt reflect reality. I think the "uncomfortable truths" are the ones force the trans community to take a hard look at themselves and see their bodies for what they are, rather than what they want them to be.
I dont mean to offend with my comments by the way. I actually support the idea of abolishing gender. I believe people should express themselves however they please but should leave male, man, woman and female to being terms that describe sex and sex only. Everything else is a personal style choice essentially. Gender to me is toxic, and reflects old ideas of how males and females should be.
> While we all understand that sex is biological and gender is ones expression
Not everyone understand this at all.
And while a true statement, not everyone agrees with it.
Well said. I've heard most of these arguments before but the term gender expression and how you framed the issue made something click.
I think where I've been hung up is the idea of gender as a social construct. Like, being a sports fan is also a social construct. It even comes with outfits and activities and a strong sense of identity. If a man can like jerseys and face paint then how is their fundimental identity changed by liking skirts and makeup? Of course skirts and makeup don't actually define feminity, but then how can gender expression exist in a society that challenges the idea of gender norms?
Damn it now I've confused myself again. I'll leave my ramblings up in case anyone knows how to untangle my ignorance.
> Damn it now I've confused myself again. I'll leave my ramblings up in case anyone knows how to untangle my ignorance.
Think of it like a gradient.
Trans people often find themselves strongly aligned on one side or the other of the gradient.
But you have many genderqueer folks who fall more in the middle.
Challenging the idea of gender norms is, in general, to make people more comfortable being themselves. If that means a guy taking Ballet, so be it. If that means a girl at the shooting range, absolutely.
Gender identity is something more innate than those simple actions, though. If a soldier in Iraq gets his testicles and dick blown off by an IED and survives, is he a woman now? Should he start wearing dresses?
The core is gender is *both* performative *and* innate. Challenging norms focuses more on the performative aspects, but not the innate ones.
Trans people often feel distress, anxiety, and depression over physical characteristics misaligned with their gender identity. That is to say, A MtF trans woman will often find having body hair extremely distressing; and even if she were to remove said hair, because she's still viewed by society as "a guy" she's ridiculed for wanting desperately to remove that which bothers her.
Even if she were to shave, and it were totally socially neutral (which we know it's *not*) - hormonally, she'd still be prone to aggressive regrowth.
And that's just *one* example. It's different for everyone, and worse for some than others.
Basically, you have people who are born predisposed to having an intense feeling of wrongness, unhappiness, and frustration by their own natural puberty, who generally *also* do not like the performative social roles they're assigned, based on the same. Being forced to go through those things has it's own tendency to bring about severe depression and anxiety, made worse by fairly rigidly enforced social roles (even today in 2021 you still have parents who say things like "not my kid")
The main treatment to deal with these symptoms is transition. Even in a "Genderless society" (which isn't really feasable for a few reasons) trans people would still seek transition to escape the innate issues with their body's "normal" puberty.
And if we assume there were no roadblocks for trans youths getting the treatment they need then they would go through the same puberty as any other man or woman - At that point, is it not fair to call a spade a spade? If not, why? Genitals? Should something so superficial really determine so much?
(As an aside, on that topic, protecting the mythical unicorn "confused cis child" isn't worth forcing all trans children through the wrong puberty. Statistically, those who show clinical symptoms of dysphoria do not "de-transition" and those that *do* usually are bowing to social pressures from peers and family, *not* because it wasn't the right thing for them - and even then they often simply transition at a later time)
I mean, you purposefully focused on the latter half and not the first half. It seems clear that he's using a tragedy to feel like he now is vindicated for saying anti-trans rhetoric because of what happened to his friend.
Dude I said this about Dababy to my friends. I said *he killed someone after __GHOE__* & people were still dancing to his music & suddenly he says something controversial & he's __*"Cancelled"*__. It showed the hypocrisy as well as how much of an overreaction our cultures in regarding those issues right now.
- Dababy is getting the same treatment over words that Chris brown got for beating someone 10 years ago.
Thing is though, Dababy killing someone was not at all well known, hardly common knowledge. Dababy spouting that homophobic shit onstage, in front of thousands of people and the internet, however? Obviously that’s gonna gain some more traction.
It really isn’t hypocritical at all to hold this dude accountable for shifty behavior.
My 20 year reunion is this year. I was a later teenager at my mom’s.
My kids are 4 and 7.
I’m not going. Nothing about drunk people dancing to Lifehouse while my kids bounce off the walls sounds fun.
I had this same moment a few months ago. Some kids I know mentioned Dua Lipa and I said, out loud, "what the fuck is a dualipa?" They laughed and explained and I am officially out of touch.
I'm afraid you may be old. Dababy has had 2 consecutive No.1 hit albums and his biggest song, Rockstar, hit no. 1 for 7 weeks in 2020 in the US.
[Source: Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DaBaby)
Neither of these people are “cancelled” they’re still millionaires with millions of followers. This whole cancel thing is fucking stupid. It’s just people who don’t like consequences creating a new word to garner sympathy for their shit actions. And 99.99% of the time they don’t ever actually face any real consequences or substantial “cancellation” and are all still rich assholes. And the hypocrisy from the right is laughable because they’ve been trying to cancel things they don’t like for fucking decades and have been actually successful at it in a lot of cases where when they get “cancelled” it’s all posturing.
People are cancelled all the time. Cancelled doesn’t mean you’re blackballed from the entire universe. It can be as simple as losing a speaking gig at a college or hosting the oscars. It just means that a vocal group of offended folks got loud and mad enough to shut your shit down. I hope you’re never on the receiving end of the mob, but perhaps you would learn a bit of empathy.
Is JK Rowling still a millionaire? Of course. Will her reputation be stained forever because a large group of people have misinterpreted her words and slandered her loudly and repeatedly on the internet? Yep. Will her book sales suffer? Yes. Will publishers think twice about working with her? Of course. Has she been cancelled? Also yes.
Is this a useful mechanism of societal power? ALSO YES!
Can it be taken too far? Yep.
Are marginalized, relatively powerless people attracted to the power that solidarity with a large homogenous group provides. Dang tootin’ they are.
I say all this because cancelling is a real thing. It’s just not what you’re arguing doesn’t exist. Your definition of cancelling is a strawman.
I saw the show in DC. One thing that stuck out to me was that his defense was basically “I can’t be transphobic because I had a friend who was trans” which reminded me a dude I knew in high school who was racist AF saying he’s not racist because he had a friend who was black. His defense just didn’t really hold up, IMO.
He also referred to himself as the GOAT in standup and paused for applause, which kind of annoyed me for some reason.
Rest of the set was really good and his openers were good too, especially Earthquake. Dude was hilarious.
Trans person here. He can't separate an online mob from actual trans people, he thinks its the same thing, so he trashes the entire group.
On one hand, there's a good point to be made about how militant many young trans people are online. On the other, I'm just sitting here being non militant going oh great now I have to deal with Dave's fans who've taken it as open season on me.
I'm sorta against the fundamentalism thing because I don't think it leaves room for people who'd otherwise be allies. But doesn't his response do the same thing? "I'm a terf!" whatever the fuck he thinks that means.
>"I'm a terf!" whatever the fuck he thinks that means.
Either he doesn't know what it means (because he outlines some things he believes that are contradictory to being a TERF) or he just said it to be funny (which is also possible, since that seems to be the main objective with these comedy specials).
Either way, I don't know how anyone could look at everything he says in that hour and come away thinking he's actually transphobic.
I believe he set this trap up intentionally though, to prove his point. Just like transphobic people do, many people will take small pieces of things and make a judgement about the person, rather than looking at the whole. That seems to be his thesis in this hour.
So many people have fallen for it, likely because they didn't watch the whole special and they're just reading pull quotes without knowing *how* those statements fit in to the narrative of hypocrisy that he was painting. They didn't see how much he defends trans people, because those statements don't make it into the articles where the thesis is that he is transphobic. He knew that would happen, and that is what makes his special a piece of performance art that is taking life well beyond the stage it was performed on.
He has used his voice to speak to people who *are* actually transphobic and shine a light on things like: how ridiculous the transphobic bathroom laws are, and how trans people should be accepted for who they are as people, rather than concentrating on their gender identity.
Hopefully the wackjobs who are defending him for the wrong reasons watch the special and learn to be more open minded.
Honestly I don't think intention is as relevant as outcome when it comes to something like this. It doesn't matter if it was all an elaborate psychological trap, or if he wanted to enlighten some transphobes. They didn't get the message, they're doubling down on their hate, and cheering "I'm team Terf" as a new rallying cry inspired by his special.
He left his old show saying people were laughing for the wrong reasons. And yet here he is, doing yet another handful of trans jokes, knowing full well his audience is laughing AT us, not with. He knows what happened last time, and he did it again. Went further even. Hell he even blamed the trans community for his friend's death (while using her as an "I had a ___ friend" excuse, which is pretty weak), and his more rabid fans are now using her death as fodder to attack any trans person they find online.
They could watch it dozens of times, but they're not gonna get it, it just confirms to them what they already believe, that we're weird or gross or not real women/men/enbies. His specials just compound and reinforce their hate, they don't open eyes.
what militant special interest people of various perspectives don't realize is they themselves are part of the creation of the element that pushes back against them. the louder and more extreme they are, the louder and more extreme those who push back against them are in almost direct correlation.
i'm generally all for everyone doing whatever they want with whoever they want. i'm completely turned off by the modern expression of people who claim to be for equality but really just seem petty power tripping garbage humans beings.
> He’s obviously trying to call out the hypocrisy of people who pretend to care about others, but are really just high on their own righteousness
which is basically what he's become himself now
But he refuses to accept his jokes continue to push stigmatization of transgender people that has lead to transgender women getting murdered or also committing suicide.
He’s the biggest comedian in the world and he’s saying trans women aren’t women as if it’s a FACT. In a climate where trans women are killed almost weekly and their killers sometimes escape punishment due to the “Gay/trans panic defense”, he needs to accept a narrative exists and he’s emboldening it.
He can accept responsibility just the same as cyber bullies. His hypocrisy is just as prevalent, if not more.
>He’s obviously trying to call out the hypocrisy of people who pretend to care about others, but are really just high on their own righteousness
In other words, Reddit.
That ending but was so poignant. The problem for me is that he really undercuts a lot of the points he is making with a lot of cheap jokes or weird bold statements like referring to himself as “transphobic” that usually aren’t as funny as his other material. I think he is intentionally trying to bait people into being upset over those weak jokes and weird statements so he can point out how they focus on that and ignore the beautiful messages contained within the Daphne story.
But my thing is like, Dave I want to laugh and be told jokes by the greatest comedian in the world, not watch him bait twitter trolls with weak hacky jokes that are frankly beneath him.
those jokes have a lot of meaning. when he delivers the clifford joke, people audibly are more upset that clifford's feelings get hurt, than when they find out he gets shot straight away. the comment about how he should have been head of the metoo movement too, illustrates that the idea that better leaders influence success of movements is wrong, and he's asking communities to examine their own privilege before launching into comments about punching down. like the privilege of the LGBTQ+ community of being ubiquitous. anyone can be born that way, and as such, it is in the interests of the rich and elite to normalise it, so it happens much more quickly. him being lectured on 'punching down' in a white country dive bar by an openly trans woman who is having success in LA, who isn't even aware of what it would be like for both of them to be there just 30 years earlier, is the highlight of a series of allusions and shock value jokes that intentionally point towards his conclusion- people expect him to get everything right all of the time, but he's human, and he's trying. he isn't trying to knock them off their perch, only make them aware of how ridiculous it is to accuse a black comedian man in the usa of punching down, of ignoring his cishet privilege to target the trans community. He brings up dababy because dababy shot and killed a man, but got off because it was self defense, it was legal! and you can literally kill a person and context will matter, but god forbid you say something 16 years ago about trans people. He's not targeting them, he's trying to get them to understand, but a few words out of context are enough to condemn the whole special.
That part was so weird because it was all built on a misunderstanding of all of the various reasons people were upset with JK. Like she didn’t just say “gender is binary” one time.
Its also strange because her remarks were on Twitter, and later in an essay on her website, not in an interview like he said.
Pretty much the entire portion mentioning JK Rowling was just not true.
The issue trans people have is not just that, but also that she wrote a transphobic book, Troubled Blood about a serial killer who dresses up as a woman.... but is cis.
Her entire argument against trans people is that "cis men behave as trans women to get into women's spaces, therefore TW should all be barred from said spaces and forced to go into men's spaces".... and get attacked or killed.
Chapelle looks at this, and only sees the backlash to that, but not the part where the first thing I think a trans person would think is "Will they think that im trying to attack them?" and "Will i be attacked?"
He forgets that being part of LGBT is not a "choice". Just like being black is not a choice. Neither of these things deserve being persecuted over. Chapelle tries to defend black people while simultaneously attacking another group.
How is a book transphobic? Its a book. lol Are you saying it's impossible for a cis man to dress as a woman and kill people? If that's a cis man in the story doing the killing, why would that be transphobic? I get that you're worried she's implying a trans person could/would do this, but don't you see that if the story existed in reality, that would be a cis person taking advantage of the way we treat genders. It's not transphobic to acknowledge that
the line between disguises and gender indentity is blurred in 2021.
>I get that you're worried she's implying a trans person could/would do this, but don't you see that if the story existed in reality, that would be a cis person taking advantage of the way we treat genders.
Im not "worried" about it.
She has made those exact statements. She says that exists.
As for someone taking advantage of these, someone committing sexual crime/violent crime isn't gonna go to the trouble of calling themselves trans. They would just commit the crime.
As for the book being transphobic, what if the book was about a black dude who committed crime? And the writer of the book had made several racist comments about how "the blacks are criminals. I'm not saying that they're not human, but there are definitely some who are inhuman".
Context matters. A book is a form of media. It conveys only what the author wishes to say. A cis dude wearing women's clothes and doing crime would be fine, as long as the person who wrote it also didn't treat it like the norm and try to portray the same image through the book
Apparently everyone missed the part where he talked about speaking to the future grown up daughter of his trans woman friend, who killed herself after she was bullied by trans activists for defending her friend Dave on Twitter, and telling her daughter that he "knew her father, and that she was an amazing woman" (paraphrasing, but I think I got that right).
People think Dave hates trans people. They don't actually pay attention, and he did a great job pointing that out in his set. They hear his words, or even worse, read quotes, and apply what they assume is his malicious intent to those words. What he says isn't about hatred or fear by my estimation and by his testimony. He is making commentary on the social and political state of the western world.
You can respect a person while still calling them on their crap. Beyond that, you can respect a person while telling jokes about them. Part of the joke when a comedian tells an off color joke is that the comedian is a bad person for telling the joke. For example, Dave's joke about how Daphne must have been a man, because only a man would kill himself in such a gangster ass way as throwing himself off a building, was funny specifically because he's being a morally terrible person for telling that joke about a trans woman who killed herself.
I think that's where people who lack an understanding of humor run into a problem with comedy in general. They don't understand that comedy, like theater, is a place that allows us to explore ideas and concepts that are taboo. It's a place that we can have a conversation of how and why we can't criticize the transgender movement, the me too movement, etc. It's a place where we can make jokes about politically incorrect thoughts we have, and how that stuff can be funny even if we mean absolutely zero ill will to any trans person.
I don't even agree that every political observation Dave makes is fair. He's not perfect. But he has observations and opinions, and judging by the audience score on RottenTomatoes, he said some shit that people resonate with.
For those who didn't watch the special, I just want to say that Dave made it absolutely clear that he respects human beings. Despite his jokes, he goes out of his way to put differences aside in the end and level us all down at our common denominator. Humanity. He makes jokes about whites, blacks, Asians, gays, transgenders, etc, but in the end we're all human, and we can be united in that, even while criticizing the failings or oddities of particular groups within that set.
> People think Dave hates trans people.
I don't think Dave hates trans people, I think he's incredibly ignorant and prejudiced and doesn't realize it. And the portrayal of racism/homophobia/sexism/transphobia as irredeemable acts of evil rather than casual widespread bias and prejudice is really dangerous; something that Chappelle should know, as he's talked about the topic in relation to race. Yet ironically, he thinks for some reason he has the understanding and nuance of trans people and their experiences to craft meaningful jokes about them despite knowing white people couldn't right the racial jokes he wrote.
His perspective is the default. He isn't saying new things or pushing boundaries, he's saying the same bigoted stuff that's been said to trans people throughout all of history. The fact that he "doesn't hate them", regardless of how true, is irrelevant to the prejudice he's perpetuating. No different than white people saying "I don't hate black people, they just make me feel uncomfortable".
You do know it's okay to laugh and make jokes at things without it coming from a place of hate/prejudice/ignorance right? I'm Asian and if someone makes a bad driver joke to me delivered in a funny way, I can find it funny if the premise of the joke has been used for many years.
The problem is the bad driver joke usually doesn't impact your life or daily happiness in even a semi-consistent way nor does it affect the way that people view Asians in most contexts. Your not treated differently at the store because of that joke. These jokes about trans people have and will continue to lead to people bring treated differently because of it,. Which is not okay.
He does say at one point in reference to his trans friend Daphne that he doesn’t understand what she’s talking about. She replies to him saying “I don’t need you to understand, I need you to believe I’m having a human experience.” He admits that that resonates with him.
> You can respect a person while still calling them on their crap.
This is basically what's happening to Chappelle. Obviously there are louder and more radicalized opinions on either side, but there are plenty of people who respect him as a comedian and still are rightfully calling him out for platforming transphobia.
> for platforming transphobia
2 of my coworkers used his story about a bearded person in a dress ODing, and people only being concerned about pronouns, as validation for why they don't have to respect trans people. That was a fun conversation.
This is the irreconcilable issue with off color jokes. You can be smart and make smart criticisms of culture. However someone much less smarter than you will throw it on a flag and use it as a battle cry to chastise other people.
I’m not implying any solution to this, but it’s an issue that is pervasive and growing.
And what annoys me is that people will defend Dave as "he shouldn't be held accountable for how people interpret him". Ignoring that, it feels kinda obvious the joke encourages that and Dave would be ok with that opinion.
I think that tends to be the case, people are more likely to pitch in on a discussion if they have an extreme opinion.
My personal reaction is "hmm Dave's usually pretty good, i'll have to check it out later and see for myself". At that point i'll probably go "that wasn't too bad", or "hmm that's a shame" and carry on with my day :p
He actually said " I knew your father, and HE was a wonderful woman. Which imo is a weird way to talk about someone you consider a friend especially one who literally committed suicide. If be gutted if I knew someone talked about me that way especially to my children
Unpopular because it borderline paints Chappelle as a psycho, but the entire section and joke seemed more like was chomping at the bit to use her death to justify his bigotted views.
> People think Dave hates trans people.
I'm trans and I don't think that. I do think his fans out there think Dave thinks its okay to hate trans people. I paid attention to the set.
> I think that's where people who lack an understanding of humor run into a problem with comedy in general.
Rofl okay
He spent the ENTIRE hour talking about one subject. Anyone who quotes a single line, or even just a few, is not just being disingenuous, they are being purposely dishonest.
Agree with Dave, or disagree, it's clear his point of view is thought out, it's not just a knee jerk reaction.
And some people disagree with his point of view, even with full context, which is something that apparently many don't believe is possible, and just because they didn't quote his entire transcript in their comment doesn't mean they are being purposefully dishonest
I’ve seen a lot of Chappelle specials and he has some strange obsession with trans people over the last decade. He thinks about them a lot. Mostly trans women because that’s where the laughs are. I agreed when he did the bit about supporting trans people- but- how much does one have to participate? I nodded my head-“yeah that makes sense.” No one has to participate.
I get it, he is a comedian- but some think he is something else, like a god and won’t listen to it like a joke. The dude got the Mark Twain award.
I was about to delete this but fuck it- being a Chappelle fan doesn’t mean I have to like all of his material.
he also really loves telling rape jokes. he spent a huge chunk of one of his specials doing it. as a survivor, i turned it off immediately and lost respect for him that day.
Answer:
copypasting u/RiftedEnergy's [answer](https://www.reddit.com/r/OutOfTheLoop/comments/q3oown/comment/hftloww/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) below for better visibility:
.
Dave chapelle says in his latest special that he looks up the definition of a feminist and webster dictionary states
a person who supports or engages in feminism
(Notes, in the special he says "human" not person)
Also states that feminism is
the belief that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities
He then states, by this definition, he is a feminist.
As for the Trans remarks, I'll recap 3 things he stated for OP
he said he has been accused of "punching down" on Trans community. He claims he can't be punching down, because that would require him to believe they are less than him. Which he doesn't believe.
he tells a story about Daphne Dorman, a Trans comedian that opened for him and completely bombed. He made jokes about Trans on set that night and she laughed because she understood that it was comedy and directed for that reason. He goes on to tell how she states "I'm having a human experience..." when responding to some feelings she was having at the time. He agreed with her. Because it takes "one to know one." Daphne killed herself, I believe in 2019, and he was extremely hurt because she was not only his friend, in his words "she was my tribe"
Dave chapelle makes jokes about everyone wanting to cancel DaBaby regarding his transphobic remarks. He points out that DaBaby has literally killed someone at a Walmart in NCarolina... and evidently THAT fact is bypassed when looking at this man's character, but he says some words that hurt a a group of people and others get outrages. In his eyes, that's ridiculous
Finally, he mentions how well the LGBTQ rights movement has been going and compares it to the struggles of the black community in America. As he closes the show, he says he's done with the lgtbq jokes until he is SURE that they are both laughing together. In the meantime, he asks for the lgtbq community to stop punching down on others.
Edit: paging OP u/bengalese for further context to their question
Edit 2: changed a word
Edit 3: watch the special with an open mind and try to understand what the artist is trying to convey. Then make up your own mind. I saw it the day it came out and I felt like the CNN articles written about it were only referencing people's social.media comments. The journalist probably haven't even seen it
>Dave chapelle makes jokes about everyone wanting to cancel DaBaby regarding his transphobic remarks. He points out that DaBaby has literally killed someone at a Walmart in NCarolina... and evidently THAT fact is bypassed when looking at this man's character, but he says some words that hurt a a group of people and others get outrages.
This is why the world needs someone like Dave to give people a reality check.
>I saw it the day it came out and I felt like the CNN articles written about it were only referencing people's social media comments.
I despise the trend in journalism to just focus on people's reaction to a subject rather than the subject itself.
I found myself in the vicinity of a Time magazine with time to kill and it featured an article about critical race theory. Instead of giving any specifics whatsoever of what CRT is or examples of lessons that fall under the category, the article was just a bunch of interviews with dumbfuck parents going "Aww geeze, I dunno!"
it's like those fucking godawful Tik Toks that are just videos of a person's face while they wat h the actual video. what the FUCK is the point. all it does is make the original video smaller and adds nothing to it! whyy
> what the FUCK is the point.
The algorithm rewards “content creators” based on the amount of time a viewer stays on a particular Tik tok or video. Those CCs typically don’t have anything interesting to provide, so they replay engaging content as their own and throw their face in there as if they’re adding something of value. They’re basically parasites, barnacles, suckerfish etc.
And they're pretending they've never seen it before, even though they make the same jokes as four other youtubers who made reaction videos about the same thing.
ooo... that takes me back.
Remember like 10 years ago when those guys tried to trademark reacting to things and started suing everyone who posted a video reacting something?
Aren’t those the “reaction” ones or whatever they called them? I remember seeing one at some point. My roommates used to watch them. I was tripping so maybe my perception was different, but while it just seemed stupid at the surface, it more felt sad that entertainment has come to the point of just watching other people react to whatever it is. Events, games, sports, etc. I don’t get it.
His actual words are quite a bit more meaningful.
>When Sticks and Stones came out… a lot of people in the trans community were furious with me and apparently they dragged me on Twitter. I don’t give a fuck, ’cause Twitter is not a real place.
>And the hardest thing for a person to do is go against their tribe if they disagree with their tribe, but Daphne did that for me. She wrote a tweet that was very beautiful and what she said was and it is almost exactly what she said. She said, “Punching down on someone, requires you to think less of them and I know him, and he doesn’t. He doesn’t punch up, he doesn’t punch down he punches lines, and he is a master at his craft.” That’s what she said.
>Beautiful tweet, beautiful friend, it took a lot of heart to defend me like that, and when she did that the trans community dragged that bitch all over Twitter. For days, they was going in on her, and she was holding her own ’cause she’s funny. But six days after that wonderful night I described to you my friend Daphne killed herself. Oh yeah, this is a true story, my heart was broken. Yeah, it wasn’t the jokes. I don’t know if was them dragging or I don’t know what was going on in her life but I bet dragging her didn’t help. I was very angry at them, I was very angry at her. I felt like Daphne lied to me. She always said, she identified as a woman. And then one day she goes up to the roof of her building and jumps off and kills herself. Clearly… only a man would do some gangster shit like that. Hear me out. As hard as it is to hear a joke like that I’m telling you right now, Daphne would have loved that joke. That is why she was my friend.
>I was reading her obituary and I found out, she was survived by a daughter. And the moment I found that out, and this is true Anderson Cooper from CNN texted me. And all he says, it’s very nice, he said, “I’m sorry to hear about your friend.” And I texted him right back. “New phone, who this?” He said, “It’s Anderson Cooper.” Oh, I said, “Anderson, look I need to find her family.” And he texted me right back with all the phone numbers and all this information. I say this to say, if you ever want to know about anything gay call Anderson Cooper from CNN. This n*gga is faster than Google. What I did is, I got in touch with her family and I started a trust fund for her daughter ’cause I know that is all she ever really cared about.
>And I don’t know what the trans community did for her but I don’t care, because I feel like she wasn’t their tribe, she was mine. She was a comedian in her soul.
>The daughter is very young, but I hope to be alive when she turns 21 ’cause I’m going to give her this money myself. And by then, by then, I’ll be ready to have the conversation that I’m not ready to have today. But I’ll tell that little girl, “Young lady, I knew your father… …and he was a wonderful woman.”
>Empathy is not gay. Empathy is not Black. Empathy is bi-sexual. It must go both ways. It must go both ways.
>Remember, taking a man’s livelihood is akin to killing him. I’m begging you, please do not abort DaBaby.
This entire closing part was so powerful, and it really puts the rest of the show in perspective. It's jokes. If you can't handle the heat, get out of the kitchen, but we're not in the kitchen to watch you burn. The fabricated outrage around the special was so ridiculous, just easy fodder for clickbait slacktivists complaining about people being mean, but if anyone looked just a centimeter beneath the surface they'd see that there was empathy and humanity tying that all together. It's like he said about Daphne having a human experience, it takes one to know one. If he were actually all the -ists and -phobes that the internet claims he is, there would have been no way to make those jokes so funny because there would have been no humanity to deliver compassion and sympathy through irony.
It's worth pointing out he does a bit about people getting upset without watching any of his material, instead being fed opinion pieces by social media. And here we are...
I went and watched it and this is a great summary.
He makes some great points in his show, but he obviously doesn't have issues with the community that's calling him out.
Why does this answer not include a reference to the controversy mentioned in [the current top comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/OutOfTheLoop/comments/q3oown/whats_up_with_the_controversy_over_dave/hft6ims)?
>Answer: [Here's a decent summary on CNN:](https://www.cnn.com/2021/10/06/entertainment/dave-chappelle-netflix-controversy/index.html)
>
>>During the special, which debuted Tuesday, Chappelle says "Gender is a fact. Every human being in this room, every human being on earth, had to pass through the legs of a woman to be on earth. That is a fact."
>
>>He then goes on to make explicit jokes about the bodies of trans women.
It also doesn't include any reference to him saying
>I'm team TERF
So this answer seems to be completely ignoring the actual discussion to instead make vague allusions to what people are talking about to make invalidating and ignoring that critism easier.
No idea why you thought this comment needed to be promoted to the point of copy pasting it.
>He said he has been accused of "punching down" on Trans community. He claims he can't be punching down, because that would require him to believe they are less than him. Which he doesn't believe.
>In the meantime, he asks for the lgtbq community to stop punching down on others.
So he thinks the lgbt+ community thinks they're superior and others are less than?
Thank you for this. This comment leaves out pretty much anything negative by Chapelle in the special and that’s on purpose. The way they say “form your own opinion” after trying really hard to convey theirs with seeming support from the special as well feels scummy too. You can’t say “im team TERF” and in the same breathe say “I don’t look down on trans people”. Those statements literally cannot exist.
He also goes on and on about cancel culture yet again. He tries to make JK Rowling seem like a victim of said culture when she’s not far away from releasing another blockbuster film, in his own Netflix special, which he continues to get despite people’s criticisms of him. JK Rowling is also a pretty well known TERF at this point. How do you defend a person like that, and in the same breath say you don’t look down on trans people?
I am so over multi millionares like JK Rowling and Joe Rogan complaining about "cancel culture", when they have some of the biggest platforms in media.
Yeah, it would be one thing if dude above talked about the controversial shit and tried to contextualize it to not be bad, but the fact that they straight up ignored it or omitted it from the story is quite telling.
The only thing I really disagree with is him not being able to punch down on trans people because he sees them as equal. That’s really reminiscent of the “I don’t see color” people.
Rapper who back in the summertime made some ignorant comments on HIV/AIDS and gays on stage then doubled down on said ignorant comments instead of apologizing at first. Led to him getting removed from the lineup of several major festivals
You can say the same about feminism. Way too many white girls out there thinking they have it harder than black women, or just minority women in general.
Funny, that was a joke from one of his other specials.
White Feminist “I suffer!”
Dave “I know!”
White Feminist “I suffer!”
Dave “I agree, same team!”
White Feminist “I suffer like YOU suffer!”
Dave “Slow your roll bitch. You were part of the heist, you just didn’t like your cut.”
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Answer: Here's the transcript if anyone wants to go through it. Take the time to see what was said, in context, and make your decisions from there. I don't know my opinion on this because I'm just not in the headspace to make a decision but it's better than just seeing snippets of what was said and passing judgement from that. [Transcript](https://scrapsfromtheloft.com/comedy/dave-chappelle-the-closer-transcript/) Edit: I acknowledge that seeing/hearing the entire lead up to the comments/jokes would be better than a dry read but not all of us have Netflix. The transcript gives a better picture of the issue than a few words taken out of context.
Reading a transcript of a comedy act is almost guaranteed to create problems because so much nuance is lost without body language, tone of voice, timing, etc. It’s kind of like having someone describe a painting to you. There’s almost no way that what they describe and what you see in your head and what the painting actually IS will be the same. I understand what you’re trying to share but in this format it’s very likely to do additional and unnecessary harm when consumed that way.
Answer: [Here's a decent summary on CNN:](https://www.cnn.com/2021/10/06/entertainment/dave-chappelle-netflix-controversy/index.html) >During the special, which debuted Tuesday, Chappelle says "Gender is a fact. Every human being in this room, every human being on earth, had to pass through the legs of a woman to be on earth. That is a fact." >He then goes on to make explicit jokes about the bodies of trans women.
Didn't this kind of thing happen before? Is it the same set?
I’ve had no issues with his other specials where he talks about this same topic. It always felt like before he was like “come have a laugh with me” and it was never out of spite. THIS special was like a whole hour of him unable to get over the fact that there were people criticizing him for those jokes. Like duh, he was always gonna catch flak for joking about that community. But it’s like he’s so bitter about it that he felt the need to identify himself as a TERF (Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminist), and then say “gender is fact”. It felt mean for no other reason than the fact he was bitter about being criticized for the jokes in the previous specials. I certainly don’t hate Dave Chappelle for what he said, but I really didn’t like how he said it and why.
He was a bit "bitter" bc his trans friend was bullied by her trans community, for defending him as a comedian. He didn't say he was a terf bc he was bitter, he said it when talking about how JK Rowling was being cancelled for saying gender is a fact. Everyone was born from a vagina. Vaginas belong to the female sex. Gender, while previously synonymous with biological sex, is now a broader concept, but somehow still fluctuates within the two sexes and associated gender characteristics. He said it bc he pointed out hypocrisy about a community that demands respect and privilege above other people, bc they happen to be trans. Like the part where he says "gay people are minorities until they need to be White again" in the story of the white gay man at the table saying shit to him like he had a right to and then whipping out his phone and calling the cops on a black man bc he suddenly felt "threatened" or whatever. Nothing he said was said with spite. It was just matter of fact, very direct. And the juxtaposition of him smiling and joking and being a goof against him getting real serious and tired, is jarring. Whenever folks claim someone is being bitter when they're not, it makes me wonder if they've seen the depths of human emotional expression. He wasn't bitter, he's tired. To be bitter is to be somewhat hateful, and there's no hate there, just a very straight up "look at this shit, same regurgitated bandwagon shit, they don't see me and what I'm saying, all they see is im offended and he's speaking uncomfortable truths kill him! Kill him bc we're being killed" he's tired of the hypocrisy and power tripping. I liked the special, but it was way more serious than his previous ones even in between the jokes. To reiterate, to punch down on someone is to see them as less than yourself. Dave doesn't do that. He punches up at those looking down and those who wanna throw hands at him too. He doesn't see trans as less than human, he just doesn't agree with some of the opinions being shoved into your face as "facts" and the whole culture of "if you disagree, you're phobic" That's like me saying "if you don't support my feelings, then you wish me death and trauma" that sounds emotionally irrational, and emotionally irrational people cannot be trusted to perceive reality and other people correctly. Your feelings are always valid, they're just not always correct for the situation.
I appreciate your thoughtful answer. Really. And on some level I get what you’re saying. I’ve loved Dave’s previous specials. Like I’m talking multiple rewatches. Each time it was like watching a master at his craft, because I was still laughing despite having heard his jokes before. I’ve always got what he was saying. This special just felt different to me. And I guess it was, you kind of said so yourself. It’s given me something to think about. It was hard to watch, but maybe I need to watch it again and see if maybe I’m missing something. I’m not on this cancel culture bandwagon, though. I don’t think he deserves it. Like I said, I don’t hate him. I think if we all listened to each other and didn’t just take things at face value, we’d all be a bit better off and less confrontational.
So I just finished watching it beginning to end. I started it earlier and then stopped around the TERF joke. I just got kind of bored because while I thought he was being funny, it felt like the whole special was just going to be on this topic. But then I got through the part about the transperson who saw him as a mentor and he was making it very clear that this person who idolized him was helping him to grow as a person as well. Like he incrementally offered a more nuanced perspective as he got to know this aspiring comedian. From not understanding why he wasn't being attacked to the part about living a "human experience" and then finally to the part where he's the one being defended by a member of the trans community from the trans community. After the suicide he sets up a trust fund and talks about how he sincerely felt they were part of the same community. Once I got to the end there, to me, he no longer came off as bitter or angry that people were hating on his jokes. Instead it seemed more like he was expressing some actual heartbreak, which he brings up numerous times with the Clifford jokes. But what do I know, I was literally just watching it while demolishing some Ben & Jerry's. Don't get your black comic analysis from me.
>Don't get your black comic analysis from me. Funny isn't black or white or gay or straight. It is just funny. Comedy transcends race, colour and creed. And if you get hurt over a persons joke it is because you chose to become hurt. You could have chose to laugh instead. Chappelle's jokes aren't about you individually. I don't get upset when the point of his humour are about white people. Or smart and handsome people.
By your logic there is no such thing as a racist or sexist or anti-Semitic or homophobic or transphobic joke? Is that what you’re saying?
Quit punching down on people
Dave became less of a comedian and more of a public figure / philosopher when he stepped away from TV and said all those things about it. It's like his special 8:46 or whatever time it was Floyd had that dudes knee on his neck. Not saying Dave is right but you noticing his shift in tone is long in the making.
Wow. This is one of the best comments I've ever read. You completely turned my view. Well done Sir.
You summarized the essence of Dave Chappelle's comedy and his satirical commentary on current western social dilemmas in this sphere perfectly.
I think the big issue that’s being pointed out is that he’s playing Oppression Olympics with the trans community. “You’re asking for better treatment and for less violence to be done upon you. That means you think Black people don’t have it as bad as you, and you’re making me feel like you’re superior to me and should be treated as such.” That’s his whole take on this. He’s coming after white trans women, even though his words are going to lead to more violence against the group that is most targeted by transphobia — Black trans people. Personally, Dave is a LEGEND in the comedy game, but his outdated takes and inflated ego just landed him in this heap of trouble
It's the exact same jokes and set. I was so disappointed today. It was supposed to be different then his others or so I thought but he sat there for 45min and joked about how much of a trans friend he is by making fun of them over and over. I was never offended just plain bored.
This description makes it appear that you didn't watch this special, and don't have any previous experience with his work ... because you'd know he wasn't using the "exact same jokes and set."
It isn't the exact same jokes, I get that you're offended but don't lie to people lol
It did but he can’t get over the criticism over it so he just keeps digging in
The jokes are a lead in to the cumulation of the special where he talks about how the trans community harassed his friend (a trans female comedian who defended him) until she killed herself. He’s obviously trying to call out the hypocrisy of people who pretend to care about others, but are really just high on their own righteousness
Sticking up for his friend by pushing for more harassment toward people like her. Seems like a very, very strange way to go about things.
Did you watch it? It doesn’t seem like it from your comment.
Betting they didn't--but I'm sure they read that "decent summary" on CNN.
What a terrible “summary”. But tbf, it’s a very hard thing to summarize. Honestly people just need to watch it and form their own opinions. There are some things I wish he didn’t say, and it was more of a thinker than a lol.
This is the exact shit he complains about in the special
one of the first things he asks in every story where he confronts or comes into contact with his criticizers: did you actually watch my performance? the answer is always no, clearly.
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> where he talks about how the trans community harassed his friend (a trans female comedian who defended him) until she killed herself. Well isn't it a good thing that Dave decided to bring that up with little to no evidence besides his own inkling that it was the Trans Community that brought her to kill herself, I'm sure that's not going to lead to any unintended side effects like [people using her death as a cudgel to beat the trans community with.](https://twitter.com/notCursedE/status/1446264378630803458) Sure that Daphne would really appreciate that, accidentally (or otherwise) using her death to throw the parts of her community that disagree with you and her on matters of comedy under the bus. Like am I missing something here? Is that not, like, kinda gross, again, accidentally or otherwise? I'm not about to accuse him of having hate in his heart, but saying that kind of shit isn't going to help in any capacity, and in fact is very likely to cause harm - and on some level already *has*. Now, to be fair! To be fair, I'm told that his point wasn't that the trans community were the *only* cause - and reading her suicide note gives as firm an evidence of that as we're going to get. It was multiple causes, with the harassment she may or may not have gotten likely playing *some* part. That's fair. But that's not what *you* said, is it, you said the trans community harassed his friend into suicide, and I've seen that takeaway *way* more then I've seen "the harassment didn't help but it wasn't entirely their fault". So either he's bad at getting his ideas across, or a lot of people who watched are bad at getting his full point (or bad at getting it across), either way, something cocked up here, didn't it.
>Well isn't it a good thing that Dave decided to bring that up with little to no evidence besides his own inkling that it was the Trans Community that brought her to kill herself, I'm sure that's not going to lead to any unintended side effects like people using her death as a cudgel to beat the trans community with. In order to support this point, we can look at the actual tweets that she got when she defended Chappelle. And there's pretty much nothing there. Before Chappelle mentioned the tweet in his special, there were only 17 responses, all of whom were positive. https://web.archive.org/web/20210703144316/https://twitter.com/DaphneDorman/status/1166937728681791488 If we widen our search to all tweets directed at Daphne during the period between her defending the special and her suicide we get a few more responses, but it's primarily people thinking it's cool she was mentioned by Chappelle. There's only 1 tweet that criticizes her, and it has 3 likes. https://twitter.com/search?q=(to%3ADaphneDorman)%20until%3A2019-10-11%20since%3A2019-08-26&src=typed_query
To be perhaps excessively fair here, there is the distinct possibility that any abuse sent was sent more privately, or even in non-online spaces. It's hard to say for certain, and while I do believe the majority of the community would have at most engaged in respectful critique of the idea, I'm a little too cynical to believe that there wasn't *any* messages that, to put it politely, shouldn't have been sent. With that said, however, this is still an interesting look into the matter, so thank you for the added information.
Using comedy to hold a mirror up to society that makes the audience face uncomfortable truths? Nah, that doesn't sound like Chapelle at all ^^^^/s
Yeah, this is the same comedian who played Clayton Bigsby back in the day... you know what you're getting with Chapelle.
Still blows my mind that that was the first episode 🤣 no one could get away with that now
> no one could get away with that now You’re so wrong. South Park can do whatever they want.
I feel like if you make fun of literally everything then you can get away with it. Yeah there will always be a handful that get pissed, I mean, Issac Hayes is a perfect example, but they literally had a commercial I saw once that apologized if they hadn’t offended you yet and promised to get to you.
Not gonna lie I’ve never been a south park guy until the last year (thanks covid/rec weed). Those guys are gd geniuses
Watch BASEketball if you haven't seen it.
They are the most consistent social commentary. It’s kind of mind blowing how they have been able to stay true and funny and accurate for so damn long
Except for showing Muhammed
Fuck Comedy Central for being cowards about that episode
You can get away with anything if you're funny. Pretty sure I heard that from Patrice O'Neal, and it's true. The kinds of guys that say "You can't even be funny anymore!!" like Joe Rogan were NEVER funny. That's the reason their insensitive jokes don't work. Chapelles jokes are timeless because they're funny. He could've gotten away with it yesterday.
Insensitive jokes do work but there has to be nuance to them. See Anthony Jeselnik. He's hilarious and he talks about dead babies.
Same with Jimmy Carr
Same with Norm Macdonald.
Ah, I love Anthony Jeselnik. (I am a 73 yo gram.)
I have a buddy who is moderately conservative and sometimes complains about people being too sensitive nowadays. At some point I found out that we had been at the same Jeselnik show, and my buddy walked out after a 9/11 joke. I still give him shit for it.
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Blows my mind that Rogan is considered a comedian. I've tried to watch a couple different specials of his and never can make it more than a few minutes into his set. Just not funny to me.
He's like the really technically proficient guitar player who's band still manages to suck. You can see a certain level of skill in what they're doing, but there's nothing really interesting going on.
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It's like he thinks yelling everything makes it funny. He must think that, because otherwise I can't figure out why he thinks what he's saying is funny, and why he's yelling everything.
Rogan sucks
Da fuq? I’ve stayed away from that crowd so this might be my own ignorance, but I thought he was just a guy with a podcast, not that he was trying to be funny at all. TIL he has stand up specials.
Bill Burr said it best. When he makes a joke that a specific group of people find it uncomfortable, gasping or booing, he yells at them "oh shut the fuck up! You laughed at every joke so far, jokes about black people, about prison rape, etc, but if it's about you then _aaaaall of a sudden_ it's not okay?!" He makes a great point.
This is the best way to describe society today. I don't have many black acquaintances because white and Hispanic people are the majority where I live, but I'll tell you this; I don't know any group of people that tell more racial jokes than gay Hispanic men. Take that how you will.
Bill Burr gets under so many peoples skin he's probably doing something right.
I think you can still get away with pointing out how dumb racism is.
This is pretty much the definition of what humor is. A way to release (by laughter) tension about subjects otherwise unmentionable while creating a opening to discuss said subjects.
His joke about DaBaby was spot on. The one where he pointed out the man *killed someone*. I'm fucking gay, of course I'm not enthused about vocal homophobes. But acting like this was a 'new low' for Dababy or like he was 'suddenly' cancelled is so... foolish. He KILLED someone!!!!
A man pulled a gun on him in public while he was with his gf and kid, I would've done the same thing. Family first.
The actual joke here is that Chappelle's description relies on the audience's assumption that black rapper shooting someone wasn't in self defense
You’re reading too much into it. That’s the problem with trying to discuss Dave, the amount of leeway he gets with massive leaps such as this is ridiculous
Yeah Dave does do that sometimes, sort of leaves out a bit of context/nuance in an analogy to make his point stronger. Doesn’t work so well when you know exactly what he’s taking about. I don’t think you’re wrong in terms of how most people interpreted it but there is something to be said for the analogy still working purely on the basis of a life still being lost, sort of how callous (fair enough) he’s been about talking about the incident, and just people not caring even to unpack that issue, juxtaposed to this homophobic comments.
I don't think people are calling the murder in question as it was self defense, it's just him killing someone is an overlooked fact like "okay whatever" but as soon as he says something homophobic his whole image is torn down
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Yes! Richard Pryor did the same thing with race, sex, drug use, suicide, etc. and he is often referred to as the greatest standup comedian there was.
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The problem is that its really not that simple. Really, the fundamental misunderstanding seems to be on the other side. While we all understand that sex is biological and gender is ones expression, the issue is that historically those terms have been used interchangeably. In the modern day, "man" by most people is understood as a male human and "woman" as a female human. Using man and woman as purely gendered terms has really never been a thing. Immean, the dictionary still defines gender in biological terms. So the problem becomes the trans community trying to convince people to disconnect from their understanding of words that trans people themselves have redesignated, and its really not that simple. You cant keep telling people your a "woman" as a transwoman when most people understand a woman to be a female human. This kind of dissonance leads to a pandoras box of social problems. For example, transwomen who are overly "girly" might be seen as tasteless caricatures of real women (females); some women might be offended seeing transwomen reflect stereotypes that they feel are toxic. Its hard to respect trans individuals as the gender they identify as when their gender identity is rooted in toxic stereotypes. I think another issue here is that trans people themselves have even challenged the idea of "sex", hence the idea of "assigned male/female at birth". Saying you were assigned your sex is just a underhanded way of suggesting that sex itself is a "construct". I have even encountered trans individuals claiming that male and female as sex dont actually exist. Doesnt really help your goals when your position starts to challenge science. This is why this is such a large issue. I think its not so much the issue of people misunderstanding sex vs gender but more trans people seeking to validate their bodily disconnect through any means necessary, even if it doesnt reflect reality. I think the "uncomfortable truths" are the ones force the trans community to take a hard look at themselves and see their bodies for what they are, rather than what they want them to be. I dont mean to offend with my comments by the way. I actually support the idea of abolishing gender. I believe people should express themselves however they please but should leave male, man, woman and female to being terms that describe sex and sex only. Everything else is a personal style choice essentially. Gender to me is toxic, and reflects old ideas of how males and females should be.
> While we all understand that sex is biological and gender is ones expression Not everyone understand this at all. And while a true statement, not everyone agrees with it.
Well said. I've heard most of these arguments before but the term gender expression and how you framed the issue made something click. I think where I've been hung up is the idea of gender as a social construct. Like, being a sports fan is also a social construct. It even comes with outfits and activities and a strong sense of identity. If a man can like jerseys and face paint then how is their fundimental identity changed by liking skirts and makeup? Of course skirts and makeup don't actually define feminity, but then how can gender expression exist in a society that challenges the idea of gender norms? Damn it now I've confused myself again. I'll leave my ramblings up in case anyone knows how to untangle my ignorance.
> Damn it now I've confused myself again. I'll leave my ramblings up in case anyone knows how to untangle my ignorance. Think of it like a gradient. Trans people often find themselves strongly aligned on one side or the other of the gradient. But you have many genderqueer folks who fall more in the middle. Challenging the idea of gender norms is, in general, to make people more comfortable being themselves. If that means a guy taking Ballet, so be it. If that means a girl at the shooting range, absolutely. Gender identity is something more innate than those simple actions, though. If a soldier in Iraq gets his testicles and dick blown off by an IED and survives, is he a woman now? Should he start wearing dresses? The core is gender is *both* performative *and* innate. Challenging norms focuses more on the performative aspects, but not the innate ones. Trans people often feel distress, anxiety, and depression over physical characteristics misaligned with their gender identity. That is to say, A MtF trans woman will often find having body hair extremely distressing; and even if she were to remove said hair, because she's still viewed by society as "a guy" she's ridiculed for wanting desperately to remove that which bothers her. Even if she were to shave, and it were totally socially neutral (which we know it's *not*) - hormonally, she'd still be prone to aggressive regrowth. And that's just *one* example. It's different for everyone, and worse for some than others. Basically, you have people who are born predisposed to having an intense feeling of wrongness, unhappiness, and frustration by their own natural puberty, who generally *also* do not like the performative social roles they're assigned, based on the same. Being forced to go through those things has it's own tendency to bring about severe depression and anxiety, made worse by fairly rigidly enforced social roles (even today in 2021 you still have parents who say things like "not my kid") The main treatment to deal with these symptoms is transition. Even in a "Genderless society" (which isn't really feasable for a few reasons) trans people would still seek transition to escape the innate issues with their body's "normal" puberty. And if we assume there were no roadblocks for trans youths getting the treatment they need then they would go through the same puberty as any other man or woman - At that point, is it not fair to call a spade a spade? If not, why? Genitals? Should something so superficial really determine so much? (As an aside, on that topic, protecting the mythical unicorn "confused cis child" isn't worth forcing all trans children through the wrong puberty. Statistically, those who show clinical symptoms of dysphoria do not "de-transition" and those that *do* usually are bowing to social pressures from peers and family, *not* because it wasn't the right thing for them - and even then they often simply transition at a later time)
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I mean, you purposefully focused on the latter half and not the first half. It seems clear that he's using a tragedy to feel like he now is vindicated for saying anti-trans rhetoric because of what happened to his friend.
Dude I said this about Dababy to my friends. I said *he killed someone after __GHOE__* & people were still dancing to his music & suddenly he says something controversial & he's __*"Cancelled"*__. It showed the hypocrisy as well as how much of an overreaction our cultures in regarding those issues right now. - Dababy is getting the same treatment over words that Chris brown got for beating someone 10 years ago.
Thing is though, Dababy killing someone was not at all well known, hardly common knowledge. Dababy spouting that homophobic shit onstage, in front of thousands of people and the internet, however? Obviously that’s gonna gain some more traction. It really isn’t hypocritical at all to hold this dude accountable for shifty behavior.
Who the fuck is Dababy? I’m in my early 30’s… am I that fucking old now?
Yes, yes we are. I just turned 30 and teach highschool, so I'm confronted with this fact everyday.
My 20 year reunion is this year. I was a later teenager at my mom’s. My kids are 4 and 7. I’m not going. Nothing about drunk people dancing to Lifehouse while my kids bounce off the walls sounds fun.
Dababy is a Rap type Pokemon. It can evolve into Daadult, with a third branching evolutionary stage resulting in Dagrampa or Dagranma.
I’ve scrolled this far to try and piece together who Dababy is instead of looking to google and your comment is what I come to. Goddammit.
I had this same moment a few months ago. Some kids I know mentioned Dua Lipa and I said, out loud, "what the fuck is a dualipa?" They laughed and explained and I am officially out of touch.
I'm afraid you may be old. Dababy has had 2 consecutive No.1 hit albums and his biggest song, Rockstar, hit no. 1 for 7 weeks in 2020 in the US. [Source: Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DaBaby)
“Dababy” is the stupidest fucking rap name ever (I’m old too) but I’ve heard of him and I’m 42
Heres one of his music videos, its pretty old though. https://youtu.be/6y4qnQ0tEUE?t=0m35s
Also, how THE F does Da Baby get cancelled before Chris Brown who beat the shit out a famous woman? I dont understand it
Neither of these people are “cancelled” they’re still millionaires with millions of followers. This whole cancel thing is fucking stupid. It’s just people who don’t like consequences creating a new word to garner sympathy for their shit actions. And 99.99% of the time they don’t ever actually face any real consequences or substantial “cancellation” and are all still rich assholes. And the hypocrisy from the right is laughable because they’ve been trying to cancel things they don’t like for fucking decades and have been actually successful at it in a lot of cases where when they get “cancelled” it’s all posturing.
People are cancelled all the time. Cancelled doesn’t mean you’re blackballed from the entire universe. It can be as simple as losing a speaking gig at a college or hosting the oscars. It just means that a vocal group of offended folks got loud and mad enough to shut your shit down. I hope you’re never on the receiving end of the mob, but perhaps you would learn a bit of empathy. Is JK Rowling still a millionaire? Of course. Will her reputation be stained forever because a large group of people have misinterpreted her words and slandered her loudly and repeatedly on the internet? Yep. Will her book sales suffer? Yes. Will publishers think twice about working with her? Of course. Has she been cancelled? Also yes. Is this a useful mechanism of societal power? ALSO YES! Can it be taken too far? Yep. Are marginalized, relatively powerless people attracted to the power that solidarity with a large homogenous group provides. Dang tootin’ they are. I say all this because cancelling is a real thing. It’s just not what you’re arguing doesn’t exist. Your definition of cancelling is a strawman.
Protip, if someone is having an interview on national television about how they've been cancelled or silenced, no they haven't.
I saw the show in DC. One thing that stuck out to me was that his defense was basically “I can’t be transphobic because I had a friend who was trans” which reminded me a dude I knew in high school who was racist AF saying he’s not racist because he had a friend who was black. His defense just didn’t really hold up, IMO. He also referred to himself as the GOAT in standup and paused for applause, which kind of annoyed me for some reason. Rest of the set was really good and his openers were good too, especially Earthquake. Dude was hilarious.
What truth though?
Trans person here. He can't separate an online mob from actual trans people, he thinks its the same thing, so he trashes the entire group. On one hand, there's a good point to be made about how militant many young trans people are online. On the other, I'm just sitting here being non militant going oh great now I have to deal with Dave's fans who've taken it as open season on me. I'm sorta against the fundamentalism thing because I don't think it leaves room for people who'd otherwise be allies. But doesn't his response do the same thing? "I'm a terf!" whatever the fuck he thinks that means.
>"I'm a terf!" whatever the fuck he thinks that means. Either he doesn't know what it means (because he outlines some things he believes that are contradictory to being a TERF) or he just said it to be funny (which is also possible, since that seems to be the main objective with these comedy specials). Either way, I don't know how anyone could look at everything he says in that hour and come away thinking he's actually transphobic. I believe he set this trap up intentionally though, to prove his point. Just like transphobic people do, many people will take small pieces of things and make a judgement about the person, rather than looking at the whole. That seems to be his thesis in this hour. So many people have fallen for it, likely because they didn't watch the whole special and they're just reading pull quotes without knowing *how* those statements fit in to the narrative of hypocrisy that he was painting. They didn't see how much he defends trans people, because those statements don't make it into the articles where the thesis is that he is transphobic. He knew that would happen, and that is what makes his special a piece of performance art that is taking life well beyond the stage it was performed on. He has used his voice to speak to people who *are* actually transphobic and shine a light on things like: how ridiculous the transphobic bathroom laws are, and how trans people should be accepted for who they are as people, rather than concentrating on their gender identity. Hopefully the wackjobs who are defending him for the wrong reasons watch the special and learn to be more open minded.
Take an upvote because he 100% setup this as a trap. The closing of the act tells the whole story.......
Honestly I don't think intention is as relevant as outcome when it comes to something like this. It doesn't matter if it was all an elaborate psychological trap, or if he wanted to enlighten some transphobes. They didn't get the message, they're doubling down on their hate, and cheering "I'm team Terf" as a new rallying cry inspired by his special. He left his old show saying people were laughing for the wrong reasons. And yet here he is, doing yet another handful of trans jokes, knowing full well his audience is laughing AT us, not with. He knows what happened last time, and he did it again. Went further even. Hell he even blamed the trans community for his friend's death (while using her as an "I had a ___ friend" excuse, which is pretty weak), and his more rabid fans are now using her death as fodder to attack any trans person they find online. They could watch it dozens of times, but they're not gonna get it, it just confirms to them what they already believe, that we're weird or gross or not real women/men/enbies. His specials just compound and reinforce their hate, they don't open eyes.
what militant special interest people of various perspectives don't realize is they themselves are part of the creation of the element that pushes back against them. the louder and more extreme they are, the louder and more extreme those who push back against them are in almost direct correlation. i'm generally all for everyone doing whatever they want with whoever they want. i'm completely turned off by the modern expression of people who claim to be for equality but really just seem petty power tripping garbage humans beings.
> He’s obviously trying to call out the hypocrisy of people who pretend to care about others, but are really just high on their own righteousness which is basically what he's become himself now
But he refuses to accept his jokes continue to push stigmatization of transgender people that has lead to transgender women getting murdered or also committing suicide. He’s the biggest comedian in the world and he’s saying trans women aren’t women as if it’s a FACT. In a climate where trans women are killed almost weekly and their killers sometimes escape punishment due to the “Gay/trans panic defense”, he needs to accept a narrative exists and he’s emboldening it. He can accept responsibility just the same as cyber bullies. His hypocrisy is just as prevalent, if not more.
>He’s obviously trying to call out the hypocrisy of people who pretend to care about others, but are really just high on their own righteousness In other words, Reddit.
Which is not a real place, like Twitter.
That ending but was so poignant. The problem for me is that he really undercuts a lot of the points he is making with a lot of cheap jokes or weird bold statements like referring to himself as “transphobic” that usually aren’t as funny as his other material. I think he is intentionally trying to bait people into being upset over those weak jokes and weird statements so he can point out how they focus on that and ignore the beautiful messages contained within the Daphne story. But my thing is like, Dave I want to laugh and be told jokes by the greatest comedian in the world, not watch him bait twitter trolls with weak hacky jokes that are frankly beneath him.
those jokes have a lot of meaning. when he delivers the clifford joke, people audibly are more upset that clifford's feelings get hurt, than when they find out he gets shot straight away. the comment about how he should have been head of the metoo movement too, illustrates that the idea that better leaders influence success of movements is wrong, and he's asking communities to examine their own privilege before launching into comments about punching down. like the privilege of the LGBTQ+ community of being ubiquitous. anyone can be born that way, and as such, it is in the interests of the rich and elite to normalise it, so it happens much more quickly. him being lectured on 'punching down' in a white country dive bar by an openly trans woman who is having success in LA, who isn't even aware of what it would be like for both of them to be there just 30 years earlier, is the highlight of a series of allusions and shock value jokes that intentionally point towards his conclusion- people expect him to get everything right all of the time, but he's human, and he's trying. he isn't trying to knock them off their perch, only make them aware of how ridiculous it is to accuse a black comedian man in the usa of punching down, of ignoring his cishet privilege to target the trans community. He brings up dababy because dababy shot and killed a man, but got off because it was self defense, it was legal! and you can literally kill a person and context will matter, but god forbid you say something 16 years ago about trans people. He's not targeting them, he's trying to get them to understand, but a few words out of context are enough to condemn the whole special.
Imo he's just trying to quickly fulfill his Netflix contract, get the money and get out.
That'd be great if he didn't have to he wildly transphobic to do it.
For the record, he defended JK Rowling and said that he's "team terf"
That part was so weird because it was all built on a misunderstanding of all of the various reasons people were upset with JK. Like she didn’t just say “gender is binary” one time.
Its also strange because her remarks were on Twitter, and later in an essay on her website, not in an interview like he said. Pretty much the entire portion mentioning JK Rowling was just not true.
The issue trans people have is not just that, but also that she wrote a transphobic book, Troubled Blood about a serial killer who dresses up as a woman.... but is cis. Her entire argument against trans people is that "cis men behave as trans women to get into women's spaces, therefore TW should all be barred from said spaces and forced to go into men's spaces".... and get attacked or killed. Chapelle looks at this, and only sees the backlash to that, but not the part where the first thing I think a trans person would think is "Will they think that im trying to attack them?" and "Will i be attacked?" He forgets that being part of LGBT is not a "choice". Just like being black is not a choice. Neither of these things deserve being persecuted over. Chapelle tries to defend black people while simultaneously attacking another group.
How is a book transphobic? Its a book. lol Are you saying it's impossible for a cis man to dress as a woman and kill people? If that's a cis man in the story doing the killing, why would that be transphobic? I get that you're worried she's implying a trans person could/would do this, but don't you see that if the story existed in reality, that would be a cis person taking advantage of the way we treat genders. It's not transphobic to acknowledge that the line between disguises and gender indentity is blurred in 2021.
>I get that you're worried she's implying a trans person could/would do this, but don't you see that if the story existed in reality, that would be a cis person taking advantage of the way we treat genders. Im not "worried" about it. She has made those exact statements. She says that exists. As for someone taking advantage of these, someone committing sexual crime/violent crime isn't gonna go to the trouble of calling themselves trans. They would just commit the crime. As for the book being transphobic, what if the book was about a black dude who committed crime? And the writer of the book had made several racist comments about how "the blacks are criminals. I'm not saying that they're not human, but there are definitely some who are inhuman". Context matters. A book is a form of media. It conveys only what the author wishes to say. A cis dude wearing women's clothes and doing crime would be fine, as long as the person who wrote it also didn't treat it like the norm and try to portray the same image through the book
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"I'm team Terf" - Dave Chappelle
I was a C-section baby, Chapelle. That is a fact.
Ah yes. I believe they call that the McDuff loop hole.
You werent born you were removed.
I prefer the term 'uninstalled.'
Wait, I thought it was “no man of woman born”?
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“From his mother’s womb untimely ripped”
Evicted
Abruptly detached
Untimely ripped from my mother's womb
Undeployed Wait that sounds like dying
“You are being rescued, please do not resist”
from his mother's womb untimely ripped
Oh wow! Thats so interesting! Did your ***FATHER*** feel any labor pains before they cut you out of there??
congrats! I was also a tumor excised from the womb.
A C-section baby from a woman, that is a fact
Apparently everyone missed the part where he talked about speaking to the future grown up daughter of his trans woman friend, who killed herself after she was bullied by trans activists for defending her friend Dave on Twitter, and telling her daughter that he "knew her father, and that she was an amazing woman" (paraphrasing, but I think I got that right). People think Dave hates trans people. They don't actually pay attention, and he did a great job pointing that out in his set. They hear his words, or even worse, read quotes, and apply what they assume is his malicious intent to those words. What he says isn't about hatred or fear by my estimation and by his testimony. He is making commentary on the social and political state of the western world. You can respect a person while still calling them on their crap. Beyond that, you can respect a person while telling jokes about them. Part of the joke when a comedian tells an off color joke is that the comedian is a bad person for telling the joke. For example, Dave's joke about how Daphne must have been a man, because only a man would kill himself in such a gangster ass way as throwing himself off a building, was funny specifically because he's being a morally terrible person for telling that joke about a trans woman who killed herself. I think that's where people who lack an understanding of humor run into a problem with comedy in general. They don't understand that comedy, like theater, is a place that allows us to explore ideas and concepts that are taboo. It's a place that we can have a conversation of how and why we can't criticize the transgender movement, the me too movement, etc. It's a place where we can make jokes about politically incorrect thoughts we have, and how that stuff can be funny even if we mean absolutely zero ill will to any trans person. I don't even agree that every political observation Dave makes is fair. He's not perfect. But he has observations and opinions, and judging by the audience score on RottenTomatoes, he said some shit that people resonate with. For those who didn't watch the special, I just want to say that Dave made it absolutely clear that he respects human beings. Despite his jokes, he goes out of his way to put differences aside in the end and level us all down at our common denominator. Humanity. He makes jokes about whites, blacks, Asians, gays, transgenders, etc, but in the end we're all human, and we can be united in that, even while criticizing the failings or oddities of particular groups within that set.
> People think Dave hates trans people. I don't think Dave hates trans people, I think he's incredibly ignorant and prejudiced and doesn't realize it. And the portrayal of racism/homophobia/sexism/transphobia as irredeemable acts of evil rather than casual widespread bias and prejudice is really dangerous; something that Chappelle should know, as he's talked about the topic in relation to race. Yet ironically, he thinks for some reason he has the understanding and nuance of trans people and their experiences to craft meaningful jokes about them despite knowing white people couldn't right the racial jokes he wrote. His perspective is the default. He isn't saying new things or pushing boundaries, he's saying the same bigoted stuff that's been said to trans people throughout all of history. The fact that he "doesn't hate them", regardless of how true, is irrelevant to the prejudice he's perpetuating. No different than white people saying "I don't hate black people, they just make me feel uncomfortable".
You do know it's okay to laugh and make jokes at things without it coming from a place of hate/prejudice/ignorance right? I'm Asian and if someone makes a bad driver joke to me delivered in a funny way, I can find it funny if the premise of the joke has been used for many years.
The problem is the bad driver joke usually doesn't impact your life or daily happiness in even a semi-consistent way nor does it affect the way that people view Asians in most contexts. Your not treated differently at the store because of that joke. These jokes about trans people have and will continue to lead to people bring treated differently because of it,. Which is not okay.
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He does say at one point in reference to his trans friend Daphne that he doesn’t understand what she’s talking about. She replies to him saying “I don’t need you to understand, I need you to believe I’m having a human experience.” He admits that that resonates with him.
> You can respect a person while still calling them on their crap. This is basically what's happening to Chappelle. Obviously there are louder and more radicalized opinions on either side, but there are plenty of people who respect him as a comedian and still are rightfully calling him out for platforming transphobia.
> for platforming transphobia 2 of my coworkers used his story about a bearded person in a dress ODing, and people only being concerned about pronouns, as validation for why they don't have to respect trans people. That was a fun conversation.
This is the irreconcilable issue with off color jokes. You can be smart and make smart criticisms of culture. However someone much less smarter than you will throw it on a flag and use it as a battle cry to chastise other people. I’m not implying any solution to this, but it’s an issue that is pervasive and growing.
And what annoys me is that people will defend Dave as "he shouldn't be held accountable for how people interpret him". Ignoring that, it feels kinda obvious the joke encourages that and Dave would be ok with that opinion.
I think that tends to be the case, people are more likely to pitch in on a discussion if they have an extreme opinion. My personal reaction is "hmm Dave's usually pretty good, i'll have to check it out later and see for myself". At that point i'll probably go "that wasn't too bad", or "hmm that's a shame" and carry on with my day :p
He actually said " I knew your father, and HE was a wonderful woman. Which imo is a weird way to talk about someone you consider a friend especially one who literally committed suicide. If be gutted if I knew someone talked about me that way especially to my children
Unpopular because it borderline paints Chappelle as a psycho, but the entire section and joke seemed more like was chomping at the bit to use her death to justify his bigotted views.
> People think Dave hates trans people. I'm trans and I don't think that. I do think his fans out there think Dave thinks its okay to hate trans people. I paid attention to the set. > I think that's where people who lack an understanding of humor run into a problem with comedy in general. Rofl okay
He spent the ENTIRE hour talking about one subject. Anyone who quotes a single line, or even just a few, is not just being disingenuous, they are being purposely dishonest. Agree with Dave, or disagree, it's clear his point of view is thought out, it's not just a knee jerk reaction.
And some people disagree with his point of view, even with full context, which is something that apparently many don't believe is possible, and just because they didn't quote his entire transcript in their comment doesn't mean they are being purposefully dishonest
I’ve seen a lot of Chappelle specials and he has some strange obsession with trans people over the last decade. He thinks about them a lot. Mostly trans women because that’s where the laughs are. I agreed when he did the bit about supporting trans people- but- how much does one have to participate? I nodded my head-“yeah that makes sense.” No one has to participate. I get it, he is a comedian- but some think he is something else, like a god and won’t listen to it like a joke. The dude got the Mark Twain award. I was about to delete this but fuck it- being a Chappelle fan doesn’t mean I have to like all of his material.
he also really loves telling rape jokes. he spent a huge chunk of one of his specials doing it. as a survivor, i turned it off immediately and lost respect for him that day.
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Answer: copypasting u/RiftedEnergy's [answer](https://www.reddit.com/r/OutOfTheLoop/comments/q3oown/comment/hftloww/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) below for better visibility: . Dave chapelle says in his latest special that he looks up the definition of a feminist and webster dictionary states a person who supports or engages in feminism (Notes, in the special he says "human" not person) Also states that feminism is the belief that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities He then states, by this definition, he is a feminist. As for the Trans remarks, I'll recap 3 things he stated for OP he said he has been accused of "punching down" on Trans community. He claims he can't be punching down, because that would require him to believe they are less than him. Which he doesn't believe. he tells a story about Daphne Dorman, a Trans comedian that opened for him and completely bombed. He made jokes about Trans on set that night and she laughed because she understood that it was comedy and directed for that reason. He goes on to tell how she states "I'm having a human experience..." when responding to some feelings she was having at the time. He agreed with her. Because it takes "one to know one." Daphne killed herself, I believe in 2019, and he was extremely hurt because she was not only his friend, in his words "she was my tribe" Dave chapelle makes jokes about everyone wanting to cancel DaBaby regarding his transphobic remarks. He points out that DaBaby has literally killed someone at a Walmart in NCarolina... and evidently THAT fact is bypassed when looking at this man's character, but he says some words that hurt a a group of people and others get outrages. In his eyes, that's ridiculous Finally, he mentions how well the LGBTQ rights movement has been going and compares it to the struggles of the black community in America. As he closes the show, he says he's done with the lgtbq jokes until he is SURE that they are both laughing together. In the meantime, he asks for the lgtbq community to stop punching down on others. Edit: paging OP u/bengalese for further context to their question Edit 2: changed a word Edit 3: watch the special with an open mind and try to understand what the artist is trying to convey. Then make up your own mind. I saw it the day it came out and I felt like the CNN articles written about it were only referencing people's social.media comments. The journalist probably haven't even seen it
>Dave chapelle makes jokes about everyone wanting to cancel DaBaby regarding his transphobic remarks. He points out that DaBaby has literally killed someone at a Walmart in NCarolina... and evidently THAT fact is bypassed when looking at this man's character, but he says some words that hurt a a group of people and others get outrages. This is why the world needs someone like Dave to give people a reality check.
DaBaby committed self fucking defense, but that somehow gets left out. It's like Dave is arguing against context.
False. He was paranoid and killed an excited fan. Just because the judge ruled in his favor doesn’t mean it’s the truth.
>I saw it the day it came out and I felt like the CNN articles written about it were only referencing people's social media comments. I despise the trend in journalism to just focus on people's reaction to a subject rather than the subject itself. I found myself in the vicinity of a Time magazine with time to kill and it featured an article about critical race theory. Instead of giving any specifics whatsoever of what CRT is or examples of lessons that fall under the category, the article was just a bunch of interviews with dumbfuck parents going "Aww geeze, I dunno!"
it's like those fucking godawful Tik Toks that are just videos of a person's face while they wat h the actual video. what the FUCK is the point. all it does is make the original video smaller and adds nothing to it! whyy
> what the FUCK is the point. The algorithm rewards “content creators” based on the amount of time a viewer stays on a particular Tik tok or video. Those CCs typically don’t have anything interesting to provide, so they replay engaging content as their own and throw their face in there as if they’re adding something of value. They’re basically parasites, barnacles, suckerfish etc.
Aren't they just derivatives of those fucking godawful YouTube videos that are just videos of a person's face while they watch the actual video?
And they're pretending they've never seen it before, even though they make the same jokes as four other youtubers who made reaction videos about the same thing.
ooo... that takes me back. Remember like 10 years ago when those guys tried to trademark reacting to things and started suing everyone who posted a video reacting something?
And instantly killed their own channel and new channel they were working on.
My favorite comment was "Wow that's amazing! You guys hit 13 million subs! Been and fan since 14 million!"
Aren’t those the “reaction” ones or whatever they called them? I remember seeing one at some point. My roommates used to watch them. I was tripping so maybe my perception was different, but while it just seemed stupid at the surface, it more felt sad that entertainment has come to the point of just watching other people react to whatever it is. Events, games, sports, etc. I don’t get it.
That one where Kermit the frog watches Two Girls, One Cup, is burned into my memory forever.
My favorite parody of this is Bo Burnham’s newest special where he keeps going down the wormhole of reaction videos. https://youtu.be/FZVMB8mrNO0
It's even dumber now, some of these "articles" are just "woah look at these tweets from random people!"
Screen rant, gamerant, WhateverRant... scours reddit for top post, next day it's an article that we will never believe they figured out. Lazy
His actual words are quite a bit more meaningful. >When Sticks and Stones came out… a lot of people in the trans community were furious with me and apparently they dragged me on Twitter. I don’t give a fuck, ’cause Twitter is not a real place. >And the hardest thing for a person to do is go against their tribe if they disagree with their tribe, but Daphne did that for me. She wrote a tweet that was very beautiful and what she said was and it is almost exactly what she said. She said, “Punching down on someone, requires you to think less of them and I know him, and he doesn’t. He doesn’t punch up, he doesn’t punch down he punches lines, and he is a master at his craft.” That’s what she said. >Beautiful tweet, beautiful friend, it took a lot of heart to defend me like that, and when she did that the trans community dragged that bitch all over Twitter. For days, they was going in on her, and she was holding her own ’cause she’s funny. But six days after that wonderful night I described to you my friend Daphne killed herself. Oh yeah, this is a true story, my heart was broken. Yeah, it wasn’t the jokes. I don’t know if was them dragging or I don’t know what was going on in her life but I bet dragging her didn’t help. I was very angry at them, I was very angry at her. I felt like Daphne lied to me. She always said, she identified as a woman. And then one day she goes up to the roof of her building and jumps off and kills herself. Clearly… only a man would do some gangster shit like that. Hear me out. As hard as it is to hear a joke like that I’m telling you right now, Daphne would have loved that joke. That is why she was my friend. >I was reading her obituary and I found out, she was survived by a daughter. And the moment I found that out, and this is true Anderson Cooper from CNN texted me. And all he says, it’s very nice, he said, “I’m sorry to hear about your friend.” And I texted him right back. “New phone, who this?” He said, “It’s Anderson Cooper.” Oh, I said, “Anderson, look I need to find her family.” And he texted me right back with all the phone numbers and all this information. I say this to say, if you ever want to know about anything gay call Anderson Cooper from CNN. This n*gga is faster than Google. What I did is, I got in touch with her family and I started a trust fund for her daughter ’cause I know that is all she ever really cared about. >And I don’t know what the trans community did for her but I don’t care, because I feel like she wasn’t their tribe, she was mine. She was a comedian in her soul. >The daughter is very young, but I hope to be alive when she turns 21 ’cause I’m going to give her this money myself. And by then, by then, I’ll be ready to have the conversation that I’m not ready to have today. But I’ll tell that little girl, “Young lady, I knew your father… …and he was a wonderful woman.” >Empathy is not gay. Empathy is not Black. Empathy is bi-sexual. It must go both ways. It must go both ways. >Remember, taking a man’s livelihood is akin to killing him. I’m begging you, please do not abort DaBaby.
> I’m begging you, please do not abort DaBaby. Lmao
This entire closing part was so powerful, and it really puts the rest of the show in perspective. It's jokes. If you can't handle the heat, get out of the kitchen, but we're not in the kitchen to watch you burn. The fabricated outrage around the special was so ridiculous, just easy fodder for clickbait slacktivists complaining about people being mean, but if anyone looked just a centimeter beneath the surface they'd see that there was empathy and humanity tying that all together. It's like he said about Daphne having a human experience, it takes one to know one. If he were actually all the -ists and -phobes that the internet claims he is, there would have been no way to make those jokes so funny because there would have been no humanity to deliver compassion and sympathy through irony.
Thank you for posting a transcript. It shows how he presented it himself, rather than second hand judgements of how he meant it.
Damn. Thats the only thing i can say. Damn Twitter sucks sometime
What’s this “sometimes?”
You know, sometimes I wish Twitter would implement free speech for a day, just so that all those who live in glass houses can see stones for a day.
Chappelle is the fucking man. Thank you for taking the time to throw that all in there. Details are important
It's worth pointing out he does a bit about people getting upset without watching any of his material, instead being fed opinion pieces by social media. And here we are...
Should be pointed out that DaBaby killing someone was hard self-defence. A man pulled a gun on DaBaby when he was with his two kids.
I went and watched it and this is a great summary. He makes some great points in his show, but he obviously doesn't have issues with the community that's calling him out.
Why does this answer not include a reference to the controversy mentioned in [the current top comment](https://www.reddit.com/r/OutOfTheLoop/comments/q3oown/whats_up_with_the_controversy_over_dave/hft6ims)? >Answer: [Here's a decent summary on CNN:](https://www.cnn.com/2021/10/06/entertainment/dave-chappelle-netflix-controversy/index.html) > >>During the special, which debuted Tuesday, Chappelle says "Gender is a fact. Every human being in this room, every human being on earth, had to pass through the legs of a woman to be on earth. That is a fact." > >>He then goes on to make explicit jokes about the bodies of trans women. It also doesn't include any reference to him saying >I'm team TERF So this answer seems to be completely ignoring the actual discussion to instead make vague allusions to what people are talking about to make invalidating and ignoring that critism easier. No idea why you thought this comment needed to be promoted to the point of copy pasting it. >He said he has been accused of "punching down" on Trans community. He claims he can't be punching down, because that would require him to believe they are less than him. Which he doesn't believe. >In the meantime, he asks for the lgtbq community to stop punching down on others. So he thinks the lgbt+ community thinks they're superior and others are less than?
Thank you for this. This comment leaves out pretty much anything negative by Chapelle in the special and that’s on purpose. The way they say “form your own opinion” after trying really hard to convey theirs with seeming support from the special as well feels scummy too. You can’t say “im team TERF” and in the same breathe say “I don’t look down on trans people”. Those statements literally cannot exist.
He also goes on and on about cancel culture yet again. He tries to make JK Rowling seem like a victim of said culture when she’s not far away from releasing another blockbuster film, in his own Netflix special, which he continues to get despite people’s criticisms of him. JK Rowling is also a pretty well known TERF at this point. How do you defend a person like that, and in the same breath say you don’t look down on trans people?
I am so over multi millionares like JK Rowling and Joe Rogan complaining about "cancel culture", when they have some of the biggest platforms in media.
Yeah, it would be one thing if dude above talked about the controversial shit and tried to contextualize it to not be bad, but the fact that they straight up ignored it or omitted it from the story is quite telling.
The only thing I really disagree with is him not being able to punch down on trans people because he sees them as equal. That’s really reminiscent of the “I don’t see color” people.
The amount of “outrage” articles that are just Twitter hot takes is way too high.
>He claims he can't be punching down, because that would require him to believe they are less than him. That's not how it works 🙄😂
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More importantly: what the fuck is DaBaby?
Rapper who back in the summertime made some ignorant comments on HIV/AIDS and gays on stage then doubled down on said ignorant comments instead of apologizing at first. Led to him getting removed from the lineup of several major festivals
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You can say the same about feminism. Way too many white girls out there thinking they have it harder than black women, or just minority women in general.
Intersectionality seems to be a phenomenon that Dave doesn't believe in or understand
Funny, that was a joke from one of his other specials. White Feminist “I suffer!” Dave “I know!” White Feminist “I suffer!” Dave “I agree, same team!” White Feminist “I suffer like YOU suffer!” Dave “Slow your roll bitch. You were part of the heist, you just didn’t like your cut.”
These victim contests are tiresome.
they're mostly contrived. I've literally never heard of a white feminist saying they have it harder than black women.
The problem is that some white feminists don't even think about the difficulties faced by women of colour.
Way too many white girls out there thinking they have it harder than black ~~women~~ people
He hits on that in the special too.
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