Dave Chappelle is an uncommonly talented comedian who is way funnier than we will ever be. His latest Netflix special, released last week, has drawn praise from many conservatives for his truth-telling on transgender issues.
“They canceled J.K. Rowling, my god — she sold so many books the Bible worries about her,” Chappelle jokes. “And they canceled her because she said in an interview, and this is not exactly what she said, but effectually she said that gender was a fact.”
“I agree, man, gender is a fact,” Chappelle continues. “You have to look at it from a woman’s perspective. Look at it like this. Caitlyn Jenner, whom I have met and is a wonderful person, Caitlyn Jenner was voted Woman of the Year. Her first year as a woman! … Never even had a period. Ain’t that something? … 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. That is a fact.”
Well said.
Chappelle recounts being confronted in a rural Ohio bar by a transgender woman (a biological male who identifies as female) with two huge black, gay bodyguards. They proceeded to clap and yell in Chappelle’s face about his jokes, “punching down on my people.”
“She kept calling transgenders ‘her people,'” says Chappelle. “My people this and my people that. What do you mean, your people?” he mocked. “Were you all kidnapped in Transylvania and brought here as slaves?”
It is this “punching down” talking point that Chappelle, who is black, says annoys him most. He ends his show with the appeal: “Will you please stop punching down on my people?”
“Punching down” is a phrase the social justice movement frequently uses to police speech. People assigned to powerful groups such as “white men” or “straight males” aren’t allowed to say uncomfortable things about people assigned to less powerful groups such as black and transgender people.
Chappelle uses an example of a rapper named DaBaby to drive his point home. Apparently, DaBaby once shot and killed a black man in a Walmart and went right back to rapping. But recently, DaBaby said some mean things about gay people during a show, and now, activists are trying to cancel him.
“In our country, you can shoot and kill a black person, but you better not hurt a gay person’s feelings,” Chappelle says. “And this is precisely the disparity I wish to discuss.”
This is, unfortunately, a true statement. But don’t blame mainstream American society. The lack of consequences that black people face for killing other black people comes straight from the social justice movement. It is considered highly impolite to point out that the No. 1 cause of death for black men under the age of 44 is homicide by other black men.
Maybe if everyone was allowed to talk about that fact, we could make some progress on the issue.
