{"id":6648,"date":"2021-11-23T12:49:57","date_gmt":"2021-11-23T12:49:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=6648"},"modified":"2021-11-23T12:49:57","modified_gmt":"2021-11-23T12:49:57","slug":"what-dave-chappelle-gets-wrong-about-trans-people-and-comedy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lonecandle.com\/?p=6648","title":{"rendered":"What Dave Chappelle gets wrong about trans people and comedy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\n\n“Toward the end of Dave Chappelle\u2019s incendiary Netflix standup special The Closer<\/em>, he says something revealing about the fight he\u2019s waged against trans people \u2014 a fight that\u2019s drawn Netflix itself into the fray<\/a> and which led to a walkout and protest against the company on October 20.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After discussing the death of his friend, a trans comedian named Daphne Dorman who Chappelle also mentioned in his previous special Sticks and Stones<\/em><\/a>, Chappelle makes a joke where the punchline is to blatantly misgender her. Then he says, \u201cAs hard as it is to hear a joke like that, I\u2019m telling you right now \u2014 Daphne would have loved that joke.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As I\u2019ve attempted to grapple with the aims of Chappelle\u2019s comedy, this line has stuck with me. Chappelle\u2019s use of Dorman as a kind of totem for the type of relationship he\u2019d like to have with the trans community at large is both telling and confusing \u2014 not because of what it says about Chappelle and Dorman, but because of what it says about the nature of comedy and the nature of pain.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trans people have expressed outrage<\/a> at both Chappelle and Netflix for amplifying overtly transphobic and anti-scientific views about gender and trans identity. In his defense of Chappelle, Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos first said<\/a> that he didn\u2019t believe The Closer<\/em> could cause any real-world harm, and then, after recanting<\/a> that statement, said that trans people would simply have to deal with the special being on the platform. What we wind up with, then, is this: Yes, The Closer<\/em> could cause real-world harm, but trans people will just have to get over it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So perhaps the real question is, should trans people have to get over it? \u201cYes\u201d seems to be the answer from The Closer<\/em>, more or less. There\u2019s no getting around the reality that transphobic rhetoric like Chappelle\u2019s absolutely contributes to real-life harm. But Chappelle seems to view that hurt, and even the immediate pain of his transphobic jokes, as a worthy trade-off.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

…<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“in the moment where he comes closest to accepting trans identity, again using his friend Daphne as his lodestar, it\u2019s the semantic argument that makes the crucial difference for Chappelle. Praising Dorman for her skills as a comedian and her good-natured attitude, he recalls Dorman telling him, \u201cI don\u2019t need you to understand me. I just need you to believe that I\u2019m having a human experience.\u201d Then he points out that he accepted her explicitly \u201cbecause she didn\u2019t say anything about pronouns\u201d or make him feel like he was about to be \u201cin trouble\u201d for saying something wrong.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On one level, Chappelle\u2019s anxiety here is deeply relatable. It\u2019s the anxiety felt by many people who are frustrated by cancel culture<\/a> and what they perceive as its policing of language and free speech. No one likes to be yelled at or told they\u2019re problematic, especially if they say the \u201cwrong\u201d thing when they\u2019re trying to get clarity on complex situations. Much of the conversation around \u201ccanceling\u201d and the reactionary politics it engenders \u2014 reactionary politics that include all of Chappelle\u2019s recent comedy material \u2014 seems to demand a degree of patience with people who are still working out the basic issues surrounding complicated identity vectors. Often, thinking about these things is hard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Chappelle makes it clear that he needs Dorman to exist on his terms, not hers \u2014 not as a trans woman with autonomy, but as a trans woman who\u2019s proven she deserves autonomy by way of having a chill, laid-back sense of humor. Furthermore, in repeatedly reducing Dorman\u2019s existence to her body parts and her relationship to them and the language surrounding them, Chappelle dehumanizes her and dehumanizes other trans people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dorman\u2019s fate \u2014 she died by suicide shortly after the release of Sticks and Stones<\/em> in 2019 \u2014 directly undermines Chappelle\u2019s logic. Because Dorman was trans, she was at an extremely high risk of dying by suicide<\/a> or transphobic violence<\/a>. Any way you look at it, trans people are among the most vulnerable populations in society:<\/p>\n\n\n\n