As a general rule of thumb, you know you’re probably in the wrong if Laura Ingraham is coming to your defense. And that’s just what happened to comic Dave Chappelle.
Chappelle is once again under fire for making transphobic remarks in his new Netflix special, including declaring himself “Team TERF!” (the acronym for trans-exclusionary radical feminist), voicing his support for transphobic author J.K. Rowling, and talking obsessively about trans women’s genitalia, among other things.
Related: Dave Chappelle just “punched down” the LGBTQ community…hard
GLADD, National Black Justice Coalition, and several other civil rights groups have all issued statements condemning his transphobia and urging Netflix to pull the special from its platform, and former Dear White People showrunner Jaclyn Moore, who transitioned during the pandemic, said she’s “done” working with Netflix “as long as they continue to put out and profit from blatantly and dangerously transphobic content.”
How about we take this to the next level?
Our newsletter is like a refreshing cocktail (or mocktail) of LGBTQ+ entertainment and pop culture, served up with a side of eye-candy.
One person who is squarely in Chappelle’s corner, however, is Ingraham, who defended him last night on her show, saying he’s just another victim of the woke liberal “mob” and transphobia is awesome and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
“The mob never sleeps,” she proclaimed. “The same left-wing forces that built them up are trying to tear them down!”
Related: Dave Chappelle calls Anthony Rapp’s underage sexual assault bogus: “He grew up gay anyway”
She continued, “The fact is there is no satisfying the insane left that today’s Democrat Party’s spawned and projects. There’s no point in anyone trying to placate them or even paying attention to them, because there will always come a day when you’ll fall short of their constantly moving woke goalposts.”
“Unless you are 100% compliant and ready to compromise your beliefs for every leftist crusade, they will eventually come for you anyway. Just ask Dave.”
It’s interesting Ingraham is defending Chappelle, considering he called her a “b*tch” and a “c*nt” just last year after she made racist remarks about LeBron James. But apparently she’s willing to overlook all that if it means they can bond over their shared hatred of trans people and Democrats.
Related: Dave Chappelle said he ‘tested’ his jokes with trans comedian Daphne Dorman. She just died.
Chapelle has responded to the latest backlash by saying, “If this is what being canceled is like, I love it. F*ck Twitter. F*ck NBC News, ABC News, all these stupid-ass networks. I’m not talking to them. I’m talking to you. This is real life.”
You know what else is real life? The fact that 2020 marked the most violent year on record for attacks on trans and gender non-conforming people, according to the HRC. Sadly, 2021 is shaping up to be about as bad. The majority of victims are Black and Latinx trans women. And Chappelle’s incessant attacks on them are definitely not helping.
Watch Ingraham’s defense of Chappelle below. Or don’t.
Creamsicle
I watched Chappelle’s special. I didn’t get the overall impression that Chappelle was targeting and attacking trans people. He was comparing the entire LGBTQ+ movement to the Movement for Racial Equality and pondering out loud why one was able to redefine culture in the span of a decade, and the other struggled to even get off the ground at the Seneca Falls Convention.
I’m a gay person of color and actually think that Chappelle’s opinion represents a kind of intersectionality that a lot of young progressives simply do not want to acknowledge, in favor of a much more simplistic political narrative that all marginalized people exist in solidarity by default, which is simply not true. Chappelle even touched on it by mentioning the number of black people violently attacking AAPI in 2020 and 2021, which may hit close to home since his wife is Asian and his children are biracial.
Queer people of color know this divided reality, because we live it. Education and outreach are more effective than excommunication and outrage, but it requires the educator to face the discomfort of building a personal relationship that can supercede the preconceived notions of others and understanding that others will have a reactionary approach to understanding trangenderism, even in the rare case that they WANT to understand the trans experience better. Queer POC often need to navigate this because we need to navigate our love for families who may not have any education nor willingness to be educated on LGBTQ+ politics. My own parents don’t actually fully accept me as a gay man. I still love them even though they will likely die before ever asking to meet my partner.
Code Switching and being the uncomfortable educator is expected of POC in a LOT of different situations. It’s necessary to reciprocate in this case, and maybe it’s as simple as Chapelle needing to talk to a Centrist Gen X trans person of color. He certainly placed his relationship with a trans comic at the center of the special towards the end, and maybe had she not died by suicide, she would have been the person to educate him over time through an authentic human relationship.
Chapelle is a very successful Gen X’er. It is normal for him to be out of touch with cultural politics that are only becoming mainstream as the generation after him is beginning to recognize our power. The social and political landscape has completely transformed since the days of Chappelle’s Show, which aired just after George Bush Jr. sailed back into re-election by turning Marriage Equality into the election’s hot potato almost 20 years ago, back when most elected Democrats believed in “traditional marriage.”
Apolodorus
He made jokes about the genitals of trans women, said the lgbtq+Xyzdfk was punching down on “his community”, said he was a TERF and stated that trans women wanted to kill him.
He is a cisgender black man that considers his community to be comprised of men like him. He is an old, rich man who has consistently thrown queer people like both of us, under the bus, for lazy, crass jokes. His intersection is straight male, privilege and black. We are so beneath him that he doesn’t consider us a part of his community.
Like him, if that how your taste in comedy leans to, but let’s not pretend that he is the voice of a generation, a Cassandra of our times, a truth sayer. He is none of those things.
barryaksarben
WOW, you didnt get an over all impression. Well, that is just peachy. He was attacking trans people everytime he mentioned them. Gays have been persecuted since the beginning of time except for a few periods and places like ancient greece so to say we are not persecuted as badly is a non starter. The most often murdered group in the nation year after year are black trans women. Gays are still killed daily and anyone who knows even the littlest history knows this. Yes, there are a few states, cities and towns that have passed laws to protect gays but poc have made progress too and it isnt a contest. One persecuted group should not try to persecute another. WAY TOO MANY BLACK RAPPERS are gpoing out of their way to attack us – we are not attacking them UNTIL they spout hatred at us at one of their huge concerts.
Vince
“Chapelle is a very successful Gen X’er. It is normal for him to be out of touch with cultural politics that are only becoming mainstream as the generation after him is beginning to recognize our power.”
I understand the culture and politics that happened around say the civil war and how it caused it even though I wasn’t born in that era. We Gen Xers still have the ability to learn and change you know. Then again I’ve probably said that about the boomers when I was younger. Lol
LumpyPillows
Creamsicle is the only one to have actually watched the show. The rest of you are irrelevant.
GrizzleyMichael
I wish she would just shut up and dribble.
Hank31
Actuarial charts suggest that most of the commenters here will literally crumble long before she does!
cuteguy
She’s right, she is a c*nt
wikidBSTN
Ingraham would defend Hitler. ‘Nuff said
Fahd
To me, it’s kind of obvious that Chapelle is an a*shole and that Netflix should not be selling/supporting his brand of racism and bigotry. Ingraham and her ilk are always looking to pile on where there’s a “wedge issue”. I don’t watch her for a reason
There should be standards of conduct in comedy and reporting/commentating (whatever it is she does). Chapelle and Ingraham are examples of beyond-the-pale extremists who cynically exploit others to make a profit. We know Fox news is part of the problem, but does Netflix want to go the same way? Despicable.
I hope the pressure on Netflix to take down Chappelle continues –
LumpyPillows
You don’t watch the show. Your opinion is therefore worthless.
connorlarkin19
Lumpy pillows, change pillows from My Pillows Guy to… it’ll help your attitude.
LumpyPillows
Poor Connor, another tool who was manipulated by a biased article and did not watch the show he is now criticizing. Attacking me does not change the fact you boys are talking out your butts on this topic. As far as Mr. Pillow, you have more in common with him by spreading your lies and deceptions. Do yourself a favor and watch the Netflix special. I’ll wait for your apology.
Cam
@LumpyPillows
Translation: You’re here to troll and make little comments, but can’t put up an actually statement.
Your trolling is still sad and weak.
LumpyPillows
Always count on gullible cam to get it wrong again.
barryaksarben
WHY didnt he just stay with attackin the people with the REAL power. Straight white rich men or has he sold out for money so had to find a new villain for his comedy
ScottOnEarth
They’re both out-of-touch, bigoted c*nts who trade in intolerance, judgment and divisiveness. Of course she would defend him because he is espousing bigotry, which is her #1 priority.
inbama
Those of us who lived through the early days of the AIDS crisis when gay men went to their deaths looking like skeletons with hideous patches of black-purple cancers, while families and even friends were afraid to touch us, it was lesbian nurses and social workers who showed us compassion and affection.
Most of us only socially know transwomen who are attracted to men. They present no problem to anyone.
But now , more and more transwomen are former heterosexual men. They opt to keep their male genitalia and be accepted as lesbians. Most lesbians have no interest in “ladydick” as it’s called and so they are labeled bigots and “TERFS.” We should not be dogpiling our lesbian sisters who came to our rescue in the darkest of times. They have a right to be who they are, too.
mastik8
I just watched it. Not at all how it is being depicted. Not at all. In fact it almost appears as though the PR firm promoting it took advantage of the Trans communities feelings about Chappelle and exploited them to publicize it. Neither moral nor ethical but that’s Hollywood and btw – it worked. I would suggest watching it before rushing to judgement. For the record – Laura Ingraham is exactly what Chappelle called her.
LumpyPillows
Bingo. None of these harpies watched the show. Led by the noise by the biased article. Everything wrong with the crazy left.
Vince
Can’t stand that nazi bitch. Even her own brother called her a monster.
Hank31
He’s a very funny comedian and I am delighted that he has upset trans activists. As a rule of thumb, anything that upsets trans activists is a good thing.
I am equally happy that he and Netflix are exposing GLAAD as an impotent paper tiger. GLAAD represents no one other than its board of directors and it can’t do anything to Netflix or to Chappelle. It began as a very effective, very focused grass-roots gay organization in 1987, but it morphed into an elitist, self-perpetuating organization decades ago, and has long since ceased to be of any value to LGB people.
Cam
Blah Blah Blah.
The right wing troll account back again. Thank you for making this statement, since you only EVER support attacks on the LGBTQ community, your fevered support for Chappelle’s special says more than anything else can that it was homophobic and transphobic.
Your trying to troll actually destroyed what you were trying to do. You’re really terrible at this aren’t you?
LumpyPillows
What will happen to cam when he realizes that none of us are right wing or trolls, for that matter? Or will he own up to his fringe cancel culture losing us seats in 2022? Seriously, cam, you’re really the only troll here. Rude, smug and increasingly vapid.