Last Updated 19:12:39 UTC Sunday, October 31, 2021

US — . Dave Chappelle, one of the most well-known comedians today, was brutally criticized for making transgender jokes in his special, The Closer, which debuted on Netflix last week. Netflix stood by the comedian’s artistic expression, triggering transgender-identifying employees to try to crash an executive meeting and schedule a walkout.

In The Closer, Chappelle conveyed support for author JK Rowling, who was called a “TERF” and cancelled by social justice activist after tweeting in response to a Devex opinion piece: “People who menstruate. I’m sure there used to be a word for those people.” Chappelle said he looked up “Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminists” (TERFS) and found out that these women see “trans women” as an offensive caricature of women. The comedian declared himself “Team TERF,” and insisted “gender is a fact” and “all people on Earth had to pass through the legs of a woman to be on Earth.”

Chappelle ended the set by talking about his friend Daphne Dorman, a fellow comedian who identified as transgender. Dorman had defended mentor Chapelle from accusations of transphobia. According to Chappelle, this made transgender activists turn on and harass Dorman. Dorman committed suicide a week later in October 2019.

The set created a ton of backlash, not only on Twitter, but also at Netflix itself. Three Netflix employees, including Terra Field, were suspended.

The employees claimed the jokes in Chappelle’s comedy set were not only inappropriate, but dangerous to the lives of transgender individuals.

According to a statement by Netflix, Field and the other employees were not suspended as a result of their criticism of Chappelle’s comedy routine, but because Field and another man tried to attend a director-level meeting they were not supposed to be a part of.

Another transgender-identifying employee quit in protest of Netflix’s handling of the situation.

Netflix is supporting Chappelle, stating that he has a right to artistic freedom and that he is one of the most popular stand-up comedians today.

Chappelle is a very successful comedian, with his last special Sticks & Stones being one of the most watched, and most awarded, specials ever. Despite it being controversial, Netflix has no intentions of canceling it.

Terra Field
Terra Field (Courtesy: Twitter)

Some have supported Field, a senior software engineer, on social media platforms such as Twitter, but this has not convinced any of the top executives at Netflix to change their minds.

Field, who describes himself as “queer and trans,” has posted many tweets, and written numerous lengthy threads about Chappelle’s comedy routine. Field accused Chappelle of making “attacks” on “the trans community, and the very validity of transness – all while trying to pit us against other marginalized groups.”

Field insisted jokes like Chappelle’s lead to murder of trans-identifying individuals, particularly black trans-identifying individuals. The Netflix staffer then listed names of trans-identifying individuals who had been murdered and tweeted dramatically: “This is not an argument with two sides. It is an argument with trans people who want to be alive and people who don’t want us to be.”

39 individuals described as transgender or gender-diverse have been murdered in the US in 2021. Data from the federal government and human rights organization shows that, compared with other groups, trans-identifying individuals have one of the lowest per capita rates of deaths by homicide. Most trans-identifying individuals who are murdered were not shown to be murdered in hate crimes. Rather, most of the murder victims were involved in the prostitution trade, a highly deadly industry.

Field later announced that he had been reinstated in his role at Netflix.

There’s been a lot of debate along with questions on how Netflix should handle the remarks made by Chappelle. CEO Ted Sarandos has asked his employees for suggestions pertaining to the matter.

Sarandos said there will always be people who don’t like content on Netflix, and will even think it’s harmful. But he believes in supporting artists’ creative talent.

Transgender-identifying Netflix employees have announced that they are planning an October 20 walkout in protest of the company’s support of Chappelle’s jokes.

The family of the late Dorman came out in support of Chappelle, describing Chapelle as an “LGBTQ ally” who “loved” and “meant the world” to friend and mentee Dorman.

UPDATE 19:12:39 UTC Sunday, October 31, 2021

On the date of the protest against Netflix, comedian Vito Gesualdi held a counter-protest. Trans activists surrounded Gesauldi, and took away and broke his sign. One woman shook a tambourine in Gesualdi’s face, yelling, “Repent motherf**ker, repent!”

The Netflix CEO eventually apologized for having “screwed up that internal communication” with transgender-identifying Netflix employees. “I should have recognized the fact that a group of our employees was really hurting.” He declined to remove Chapelle’s special.

Chappelle said in a video statement posted to Instagram that he’s open to meeting and having a conversation with the trans community, but he would not bow to anyone’s demands.

Diana Shaw contributed to this article.

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17 COMMENTS

  1. It was noted in one newspaper opinion piece that you can tell who has power in a society by who you can’t make fun of. Far from being an oppressed group, trans folk, or at least trans rights activists seem to have the power here.

    36

    • Precisely. The most recent figures state that 2/3 of BLM’s donations to outside groups were to groups having to do with BIPOC transgender issues or were headed by a transgender person of color.

      Apparently adult Black men are more vulnerable than Black families dealing with the foster care system, addiction, incarceration or plain old poverty. Under the circumstances, I think Chapelle’s remarks were rather restrained.

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      • Apparently adult Black men are more vulnerable than Black families dealing with the foster care system, addiction, incarceration or plain old poverty.

        And apparently more important than the 1100 black women who have been murdered in the U.S. so far this year (typically gun homicides by intimate partners, and to a somewhat lesser degree, by family members). At more than double the rate of other women. No funds for that, though.

        facebook.com/BlackFemicideUS

        https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/66/wr/mm6628a1.htm

        In fact, the defund the police movement led by BLM and adjacent orgs contributed to the drastic rise in the genocidal massacre of black women in same communities.

        13

  2. I see these walkouts as a development to watch. There is so much sex stereotyping and violence in many Netflix titles. I wonder if anyone ever tries to take the executives to task for these violations of the social contract?

    23

    • You can only throw so many tantrums before people get sick of your crap. Let them stage their furious walkout and see 2 people turn up! Sounds like people are getting braver, with Chapelle having the guts to go there and the mgmt sticking with him. Maybe the trans tipping point is near. Thank you Mx Field, please continue.

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  3. I hope the whiners and complainers who left didn’t let the door hit ’em in the ass.

    1. How many transgenders have been killed due to comedy? “. . .Data from the federal government and human rights organization shows that, compared with other groups, trans-identifying individuals have one of the lowest per capita rates of deaths by homicide. Most trans-identifying individuals who are murdered were not shown to be murdered in hate crimes. Rather, most of the murder victims were involved in the prostitution trade, a highly deadly industry.”
    2. How many transgenders have had their lives threatened due to comedy?
    3. How is it that freedom of speech ONLY applies to transgenders and not everyone else?
    4. How many women have been harassed/threatened/silenced because of TRAs?

    I, as a member of Team TERF, so wish these self-centered, myopic whiners and complaining liars would just–go away.

    42

  6. I just finished watching all of The Closer on Netflix, after reading the 2 NY Times responses, in addition to the other media glosses all of which miss the points. The last half, particularly, is a tour de force, and I recommend it. As a retired K teacher, I have to get past the foul language, but I see Dave Chappelle’s use of irony as very Mark Twain-like, genuine and yes, funny. Chappelle had full command of the audience in Detroit, and his delivery was impeccable, his humanity clearly evident. It brought back memories of Lenny Bruce and Dick Gregory. The brittleness, the hothouse indignation, expressed by the captured, indoctrinated writers at the New York Times and elsewhere is the thin ice the trans identity-cult is walking on. I never thought I’d recommend a comedian who so thoroughly bakes in the n and b words, but I do.

    20

  7. Dave chapelle really should have known better. If he had just stuck to mocking women with repetitive, lazy sexist jokes like so many of his peers so often do there wouldnt have been a problem…

    But seriously – oh no men in dresses don’t want to be the butt of jokes? As an actual woman all i have to say is cry me a river…

    19

    • Yup. The poor men in dresses also whine about being oppressed and all I can think is – you wanted to live life as a woman or not?

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  8. Once upon a time bored, straight, frustrated white men did not have much but work & alcohol to do. Then along came methamphetamine … Coincidentally, (or is that co–morbidity) a rise in transsexuality began. Then that slightly embarrassing ‘sexuality’ part was changed to ‘gender’ once they realised that actually, nobody can change their sex. So, here we are today. Transgender women who believe they are really women because Judith Butler & their male rage has bullied frightened younger women into accepting them as feminists. How sad.

    “If your feminism prioritises the internal identifications of men over the material conditions of women then you are not a feminist.” Sarah Field, Leeds City Councillor.

    Thank You, Dave Chapelle.

    15

    • I think it’s also the BDSM from the gay bro culture too. When little lesbians are calling each other “daddy” and “tops and bottoms”and engaging in “breath play” feminism is in the sewer

      9

      • Deja vu. In the Boston area in the 1970s the feminist community was torn apart by lesbians insisting that all other women had to be acceptant of lesbian BDSM activity. A fairly well-known radical feminist lesbian insists that it was straight women who introduced this to the lesbian community — I don’t think so. I think it had a lot more to do with gay men’s influence on lesbians, and here we are again. Very depressing. Gay liberation and radical feminism were supposed to be about scrapping gender, not reinforcing it.

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  9. I really, really want to have a sit-down with Dave Chappelle, now that I’ve had feedback from my publisher, saying I might have to change the location of my life, because they are afraid of a lawsuit from my ex husband, trans identifying male, for invasion of privacy, if I tell my life story as it happened. His “transition” was completely public, just like Daphne Dorman’s, but, unlike DD’s ex-wife, I am claiming my right to my story. Dave Chappelle, thanks for calling out “woman face”, but what about her, the mother of that girl? Don’t you think, after so many women being the butt of your jokes, that you owe it to her, to say her name?

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