Superstar comic Dave Chappelle has been dominating headlines lately following his latest special and his controversial comments about transgender people.
He appeared at a screening of a movie about his life and received a standing ovation from the crowd, which included fellow celebrities like Jon Hamm, Snoop Dogg, and Brad Pitt.
“If this is what being canceled is like, I love it,” he said to the crowd at the Hollywood Bowl. In a speech that mostly skirted LGBTQ+ material, he took shots at the media and said he performs for real people.
“Fuck Twitter. Fuckk NBC News, ABC News, all these stupid ass networks. I’m not talking to them. I’m talking to you. This is real life.”
Strangely, he also shared messages of kindness during his speech.
“Do something nice for someone who looks nothing like you. We have to trust one another.”
A number of organizations have called for Netflix to pull his comedy special, called The Closer. The National Black Justice Coalition said that “Netflix should immediately pull The Closer from its platform and directly apologize to the transgender community.”
Other organizations said similar things.
“Dave Chappelle’s brand has become synonymous with ridiculing trans people and other marginalized communities,” the Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation said. “Negative reviews and viewers loudly condemning his latest special is a message to the industry that audiences don’t support platforming anti-LGBTQ diatribes. We agree.”
Chappelle also defended Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling and her statement that transgender women weren’t real women and that they threatened her identity. This caused her to be labeled a TERF — a trans-exclusionary radical feminist.
“I’m Team TERF. I agree. I agree, man,” he said, later adding that “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.”
Despite many people — including Netflix’s own employees — demanding that Dave Chappelle’s newest special be removed from the platform, there’s no word on it happening yet.
