Today, Explained - Chappelle's Show(down with the trans community)

Episode Date: October 27, 2021

Vox's Aja Romano explains how Dave Chappelle's latest standup special led to a reckoning at Netflix. Vulture's Craig Jenkins assesses whether there's anything funny in it. Today’s show was produced by Amina Al-Sadi with help from Hady Mawajdeh, edited by Matt Collette, engineered by Efim Shapiro and Cristian Ayala, fact-checked by Laura Bullard and hosted by Sean Rameswaram. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained Support Today, Explained by making a financial contribution to Vox! bit.ly/givepodcasts Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Get groceries delivered across the GTA from Real Canadian Superstore with PC Express. Shop online for super prices and super savings. Try it today and get up to $75 in PC Optimum Points. Visit superstore.ca to get started. Today's show is about the stand-up comedy of one David Chappelle and features stronger language than you typically hear on Today Explained. Let's start the show. I'd like to start by addressing the LBGTQ community director.

And I want every member of that community to know that I come here the night in peace. And I hope to negotiate the release of DaBaby. Dave Chappelle has dropped a bunch of stand-up specials on Netflix, but his latest, and apparently last, The Closer, hits a little differently. For starters, it's led to an entire reckoning at Netflix. On top of that, resounding condemnation from the trans community. And just this week, a response from the comedian himself. Asia Romano, you've been writing about The Closer for Vox. What exactly does Dave Chappelle say in it?

Most of it is him just talking about trans people. It's quite remarkable, actually, how much he talks about trans people in this special. Now, listen, women get mad at me. Gay people get mad at me. Lesbians get mad at me. But I'm going to tell you right now, and it's true. These transgenders, these niggas want me dead. I've gone too far. I've said too much he also has a moment where he misgenders one of his friends deliberately in order to sort of make

a point that we should be able to laugh at jokes like these I felt like Daphne lied to me she always says she identified as a woman and then one day she goes up to the roof of a 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's why she was my friend.

What is his greater point in this special? Why is he spending so much time focusing on the trans community? I think there are a couple of different things going on here. Chappelle himself has always been interested in calling out white privilege and elevating the oppression of Black people and drawing attention to it. And I think he believes that if you are a Black queer person or a Black trans person,

that identity vector does not matter. He has actually a line where he talks about this. I'm telling you right now, a Black gay person would have never done that to me. Because a Black gay person knows when the police shows up, they're not going to care who called them. They don't show up like, which one of you niggers is Clifford? We're all Clifford.

This is basically the broader point that he is trying to make to an extent. Any of you who have ever watched me know that I have never had a problem with transgender people. If you listen to what I'm saying, clearly my problem has always been with white people. But I think there's another element to this, which is that he thinks that trans people in their quest for correct pronoun usage and the way that they discuss things like gender and biology are essentially going too far and getting hysterical and changing what he views as basic biological facts. Gender is a fact. This 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. Are any of his arguments convincing, Asia? I think they definitely are to many of his fans who have been really supportive of his platform and his position on all these issues. And I think, for example, some of one of the more succinct points that he makes in the show is when he says he's talking about queer people and white privilege again, which is a recurring theme throughout the show, basically meaning that gay white people are white above all else, right? By the same logic that he seems to believe that black trans people are black above all else, right? So that's like kind of a way of saying that a person might be like queer or trans

until they want to like pull a race card or something like that? Or a benefit from white privilege, you know? Yeah. I thought we were going to come to blows. I was ready. I was ready. And then, and then, right when you think we would fight,

guess what he did? He picked up his phone and he called the police. And this, this thing I'm describing is a major issue that I have with that community. Gay people are minorities until they need to be wired again. And I think that's an example of, of what Chappelle does really well. You know, he says something in a way that is very concrete and pointed and sharp and succinct. But it's, to me, immediately undermined by the fact that he also doesn't seem to consider at all that Black trans people can have a profoundly different experience from Black cisgender people. And even that Black trans people exist. Because he doesn't talk a lot about

black trans people in his special he doesn't acknowledge them at all why do you think that is i think honestly because he thinks it doesn't matter there's a moment where he says you know that that if the cops are called in a gay black man that all they all the cops are going to see when they arrive at the scene is the color of the man's skin. And I think he puts that into the show as kind of like a disclaimer, you know, to talk about how he views Blackness as the most important, I guess, identity vector that someone can be if they're in that position. Obviously, that is a very valid perspective, but it's not one that's borne out by any statistic that we know about the actual lives that trans people face on a day-to-day basis, especially trans people of color, because trans people of color

face, by orders of magnitude, more harassment, more sexual assault, more police brutality, more instances of homelessness, more instances of homicide, and more instances of suicide than cisgender people. These facts are borne out by statistics and research over and over and over again. Like trans people and especially trans people of color live lives that are highly, highly marginalized and highly vulnerable. And nothing in Dave Chappelle's special really acknowledges that. And he really seems to view trans people as this sort of like group of shrill, entitled white people yammering on about pronouns

and then getting mad at him. Ultimately, he seems kind of confused in this special. He's a TERF. I'm Team TERF! Which stands for Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminist and means he's loudly and proudly transphobic, but he also sort of scolds an audience member whose four North Carolinas now repealed anti-trans bathroom bill? North Carolina passed a law once that said a person in North Carolina must use the restroom

that corresponds with the gender they were assigned on their birth certificate. No, no, no, no. No, that's not a good law. That's a mean law. No American should have to present a birth certificate to take a shit at Walmart in Greensboro, North Carolina, where the baby shot and killed a motherfucker. I mean, I think it's very muddled, honestly. I think to him, he says he's, quote, team TERF, right? Which is not quite the same as saying he is a TERF. He just sort of supports them, sort of.

And specifically talks about how he supports J.K. Rowling because J.K. Rowling was called out. I will have order. Well, part of the reason she was called out was for discussing gender essentialism and biology associated with gender. And this is something that he seems to be completely unable to accept trans people's experiences regarding. He really seems to sort of draw a line at saying

biological gender is fact and you can't change it. It's fact. That itself is a very transphobic stance that does not align with science on gender and biology. But Chappelle being very, very adamant that this is his position and his position is that gender and biology are related and inextricably linked, gives many, many, many transphobic people permission to go out and parrot that view. I think to him, he probably doesn't think that holding that belief makes him transphobic, but it certainly creates transphobia in the real world. And the concern over whether everything Dave Chappelle says will be taken as fact and parroted by his fans

is, of course, compounded by the fact that, like, he is arguably the most popular stand-up comedian in the world, right? Absolutely. Absolutely. And when you think about him having six Netflix specials, right? And just what the number of Netflix subscribers alone, that's a huge audience, you know. Which is probably why this becomes such a huge controversy within the company. I think unlike any we've ever seen when this special is released. Tell me how it's received internally at Netflix. There was immediate backlash at Netflix over this show. I think even before it was released, staffers had been worried about the impact and had been discussing it internally. The day after it was

released, various employees at Netflix made Twitter threads about it and how upset they were by it. And it almost immediately just generated lots and lots of backlash, both within the trans community and within the Netflix community of staff and employees. And the backlash was so intense and so swift that the co-CEO of Netflix, Ted Sarandos, issued an internal memo that almost made things worse because his initial response was sort of really dismissive of the idea that a show like this could have real world harm, which we know statistically is not true. Like research has shown that transphobic images in media directly impact transphobic violence in the real world, just like everything else. How do Netflix employees react to Ted's statement?

Very unhappily. They staged a protest and a walkout, basically. Workers deserve to be safe and treated respectfully at work. They deserve to be heard when they feel that the product they're being told to make is harmful. And we need Netflix to change. And even knowing that the walkout was coming, Sarandos walked back his initial statement a little bit, but he told The Hollywood Reporter in an interview

that his stance had not changed and that basically trans fans would just have to get over it because the closer was staying. What did he walk back? He walked back the idea that the show could not cause harm in the real world. He basically said, you know, I was wrong, I handled it badly.

Of course, I believe that fiction can impact real life. But, you know, Netflix is enjoying a really good quarter because of Squid Game. They are in a very good financial situation. And I think that they aren't really motivated to consider the backlash of a relatively minor part of their audience. So that's sort of the end of the story at Netflix. But then this week, Dave Chappelle himself responds to all the controversy his special stirred up. What did he say? He basically said that he wasn't going to be submitting to the trans community and the queer community. He wasn't going to let them to the trans community and the queer community. He wasn't going to let them quote unquote,

summon him to the transgender community. I am more than willing to give you an audience, but she will not summon me. I am not bending to anybody's demands. Are they trying to summon him? I mean, I don't think so. He wants to sit down with them and meet as friends,

but he wants that meeting to happen on his terms. First of all, you cannot come if you have not watched my special from beginning to end. You must come to a place of my choosing and a time of my choosing. And thirdly, you must admit that Hannah Gadsby is not funny. He basically all but says this. Like, he wants trans people to show that they have a sense of humor and that they can laugh at themselves and that they're not sticklers for pronouns and that they

won't cancel him if he gets something wrong that's what he wants but at the same time like the moment they try to set the terms of that that meeting as it were then suddenly he won't allow them to summon him you know and i think that that's a very revealing sort of power dynamic there. So Dave Chappelle would like to be an open dialogue with the trans community, but only on his own terms. That's definitely the impression that the show leaves you with. I mean, you can't really have a respectful conversation if you don't respect the terms that one half of the conversation is using.

Do you think there's any real chance here for resolution between Dave Chappelle, his Legion fans, and the trans community? I mean, this is Dave Chappelle. In the long run, he probably won't face repercussions. I mean, he might have to sit out a couple of film festivals because in the immediate aftermath of all of this, he has said that a number of film festivals aren't inviting him to show his new documentary that he's been working on. But in the end, in the long run, he's still going to be Dave Chappelle comedy legend, and he's still going to have the respect of his peers, his fans, and apparently Netflix. You have to answer the question. Am I canceled or not?

Then let's go. Thank you very much and good night. A word from our sponsors and then... Is Dave Chappelle's new special funny? Does that even matter? It should, right? I don't know. We're going to ask Craig Jenkins. He's a critic. Thank you. software designed to help you save time and put money back in your pocket. Ramp says they give finance teams unprecedented control and insight into company spend.

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Craig Jenkins, and I mean, I guess on paper, I am the pop critic at Vulture. Wicked. What are you off paper? I don't know. Trouble. Fair. When was the first time you saw Dave Chappelle doing comedy? Maybe my first time seeing him do anything is Half-Baked, you know, the pothead classic. Right near the beach.

Boy! Classic. And then I got into a little bit of his stand-up stuff, you know, saw him in films. He's in Robin Hood Men in Tights, I believe. That's right, he is. Achoo! Bless you! But yeah, I guess early on, in the general scheme of things.

So for anyone who is like too young or too old to remember, what made Dave Chappelle Dave Chappelle? It was just the irreverence and the willingness to go places where not everyone else would in the humor. That is when I knew I was in a bad neighborhood. You only see this in the worst neighborhoods. Remember, it's three o'clock in the morning. It's three o'clock in the morning. I look out the window. It was a fucking baby standing on a corner. After that, he starts to do more television. I mean, Chappelle's show essentially gives an entire quadrant of a whole generation its sense of humor in a lot of ways. And, you know, the jokes in Dora, you know, the yelling out Kobe. Kobe!

Anytime you throw a piece of paper in the trash to this day kind of thing. The Rick James stuff. I'm one of the baddest motherfuckers of all time. One of the best singers, one of the best looking motherfuckers you've ever seen. I'm Rick James, bitch. Just infinite classic sketches. And, you know, a smart sense of humor and a smart, like, sociopolitical compass underneath all that. Like, it was goofy, but it was goofy to a point, a political point, I think, often. That's not something that everyone else was doing at the time.

Yeah, the show creates all these incredible characters who are still somehow permeating our culture. What is like the most compelling stuff he does on that show when it comes to having like a deeper message? You know, stuff like the racial draft. Good evening and welcome to the first and maybe only racial draft here in New York City. Folks, this is for all the marbles. What happens here will state the racial standing of these Americans once and for all. That's right. Where, you know, he's playing up stereotypes and he's also trying to say something about them. Tremendous opportunity for me. Finally be part of a race, have a home. So long, fried rice. Hello, fried chicken. I love you guys!

You know, in the piece that I wrote about his latest stand-up special, The Closer, I mentioned the Clayton Bigsby sketch. Thank y'all for coming. White power! Which was where he plays a white supremacist who is blind and doesn't realize that he's a black person. I mean, it made the guy millions. And I don't know a person in their 20s and 30s who isn't aware of it. Although I haven't been into it in a while,

I do definitely take a spin through the show every now and then and catch the classics. And they kind of stand up, a lot of them still. He famously walks away from a $50 million contract renewal at Comedy Central to make more Chappelle's show. Why does he make that decision? We were told more recently that what inspired it is that he felt like the reach of the show had exceeded the ability of the whole audience to understand what he was getting at. More specifically, there was a sketch about blackface and he caught a white guy laughing and that made him deeply uncomfortable, is what he

says. I mean, obviously the sketch was made to make people laugh, but what was it about a white guy laughing at it that didn't sit right with him? You know, I don't think we have the most detail about that story, but like the gist of it is that he realized that there's people who are laughing a different way than he intended them to. Which is really interesting considering where we're at now. A decade or so later, Chappelle signs, I think what we know to be at least a $60 million deal with Netflix to crank out a few comedy specials for them. How's his comedy evolve in these specials? I don't know that it's evolved. You know, he's come back with the same compass and with the same

idea of morality, but there are new issues. And the way that he has approached some of them has gotten him into hot water as much as there's good and poignant stuff in a lot of those specials. And usually the majority of at least the older ones would he would be selling you something that was, you know, sharp and of the moment until he started to get into issues where he wasn't doing the reading. We've talked a bit about the hot water. Tell me about some of the poignance. You know, I especially liked 846 from last year. This is weird and less than ideal circumstances to do a show. But the only way to figure out if this shit will actually work is to do the goddamn show. Where he talks about, and without even necessarily cracking a joke, he holds the audience's attention, you know, talking about race and, you know, the issues leading up to and and stemming from the george floyd murder of last year what are you signifying that you can kneel on a man's neck for eight minutes

and 46 seconds and feel like you wouldn't get the wrath of God. That's what is happening right now. When he's really on, he's really on. Redemption Song, the one where he talks about his difficulties with Netflix, which is really like issues about ownership of the show and stuff like that. It was kind of sharp, really like weathered showbiz guy analysis that you don't really get from anyone. Because he's got that unusual trajectory. This is a very important moment. I want to thank Ted Sarandos at Netflix, a CEO who had the courage to take my show off its platform at financial detriment to his company just because I asked him. And you know, there's stuff in the specials like Equanimity and The Age of Spin, you know,

about aging and about being a dad and about, you know, rural Ohio and stuff that I thought really spoke truly to where he is right now. I live in Ohio and anyone that knows anything about Ohio knows that even the word Ohio is an old Native American word. It means literally a land of poor white people. You mentioned that in 846, which I agree is maybe the most powerful thing he's done in this sort of whatever it is, third stage of his career, it isn't that funny. He isn't doing it for the laughs. Do you think Dave Chappelle

cares how funny he is anymore? I don't think so. I don't think that there's a necessity for him to always be, you know, side-splitting. He can show up and he can give what is essentially a really dark ted talk and that could be just as fascinating as a lot of jokes you know instead which might sort of set up the question of whether the closer is funny you reviewed it for vulture and you didn't think it was that funny did you intermittently it is, but he's not on the smart side of stuff. He's really sort of got this idea that, you know, social justice is more like a rat race and the different groups, you know, get by at each other's expenses. And that doesn't account for people who fit into multiple groups at the same time.

We Blacks, we look at the gay community and we go, God damn it, look how well that movement is going. Look how well you are doing. And we've been trapped in this predicament for hundreds of years. How the fuck are you making that kind of progress? I can't help but feel like if slaves had baby oil and booty shorts, we might have been free a hundred years sooner. You know what I mean?

And he's had trouble grasping that concept in the more recent specials, particularly in The Closer, where he tries to say that, you know, his criticism of the LGBTQ community to say that, you know, his criticism of the LGBTQ community throughout the last, you know, the preceding five specials was really about white people, which sort of begs the question of, don't you realize that that community is not predominantly white necessarily, among others? What do you think it is about Chappelle and where

he's at as someone who's, you know's followed his career pretty closely for a couple decades now that this is such a motivating issue for him that he really wants to spend multiple comedy specials talking about the trans community and the LGBTQ community. You know, that happens. We've seen people like Lil Boosie, like JK Rowling, who get, you know, a bee in their bonnet about, you know, queer issues and their lack of understanding of them and the backlash that they get for speaking out of pocket about things. And then it just becomes this sort of like weird ideological obsession. Like they keep having to peck at it because like, I mean, it's a very of the moment thing. Like anything that you say that gets you a lot of smoke. So now we're in this position where Dave, who was often championed as this kind of political progressive of a sort in the past, is now resonating with right wing figures.

And this doesn't bother him. And that's fascinating because he once gave up 50 million bucks because he didn't like who was laughing. Do you think Chappelle has another great chapter in him? I mean, considering how much he's accomplished as a stand-up comic, it feels like he's given the world quite a bit. Does a comedian of his stature and his legacy need to reinvent himself one more time?

He can do it. He's smart enough to. It's a question of whether he's so hard-headed that this is going to be the future for him, that he's just going to constantly live in this gutting antagonism of people who are more progressive and try and wedge in there and not realize that he's useful to the right now. I would love to see it happen. I would also love to see him go somewhere for a while. Tonight's musical guest, two of Chicago's finest MCs, give it up for Common and Kanye West.

Yeah, Common sense. Yeah, Common sense. It's Common Sense. Kanye West on the Dave Chappelle show. Everybody gotta eat, right, y'all? It's the food, baby. Yo, I walked in the crib. Got two kids and my baby mama late.

Uh-oh, uh-oh, uh-oh. So I had to did what I had to did. Because I had to kid. Uh-oh, uh-oh, uh-oh. All night, kicking my money right into the blowing whites. Uh-oh, uh-oh, uh-oh. Now the money coming slow, but at least it'll get no slow motion better then. Uh-oh, uh-oh, uh-oh.

Craig Jenkins. He's trouble at Vulture. Amina Alsadi is a ninja here at Today Explained. She had help producing today's show from Hadi Mawagdi. Our show today was engineered by Afim Shapiro and Christian Ayala, edited by Matthew Collette, and fact-checked by Laura Bullard. The rest of the team includes Will Reed, Victoria Chamberlain, Miles Bryan, and Halima Shah.

Liz Kelly Nelson is Vox's Veep of Audio. The Deputy is Jillian Weinberger. We use music from Breakmaster Cylinder and sometimes Noam Hassenfeld. I'm Sean Ramos for M Today Explained. It's part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. Outro Music We'll be right back.