Comedian Dave Chappelle has hit out at Republicans for “weaponising” his transgender jokes, which caused protests among Netflix employees.
Back in 2021, Chappelle included jokes in his Netflix special, The Closer, which was branded transphobic. He and Netflix boss Ted Sarandos defended the so-called jokes, but trans employees walked out in protest.
Then, in his follow-up The Dreamer, Chappelle doubled down on the jokes.
However, even though he stands by his comments, it appears he has an issue with them being “politicised” and “weaponised”.
Speaking to NPR’s Newsmakers, he said: “I did resent that the Republican Party ran on transgender jokes. You know, I felt like they were doing a weaponised version of what I was doing. That’s not what I was doing.
“I’ll give you an example, before I learned the phrase, ‘I respectfully decline,’ I was on Capitol Hill, and everybody ran up to take pictures with me from every congressional office. And I just take pictures with whoever asked. I didn’t ask how they vote or what their voting record is.
“At first, it was CBC people. Then here comes Lauren Boebert and she said, ‘Can I get a picture?’ And I had already taken 40 pictures. I didn’t want to say no in front of everybody, but I didn’t know the phrase ‘I respectfully decline.’ So I just took the picture.
“And then she posted the picture before I could even get from there to the show and says something to the effect of, ‘Just two people that know that it’s just two genders.’ Just instantly, like, weaponised or politicised.
“So I got to the arena, and I lit her a*** up for doing that. And she should never do that to a person like me.”
Chappelle has long used trans folk as a punchline in his comedy specials. He also declared he was on team JK Rowling.
Elsewhere, he allegedly mocked a non-binary Saturday Night Live writer during a dress rehearsal, after they objected to him hosting.
He has again defended his jokes, saying during the same interview: “I would say that, you know, not everything is for everybody. I don’t tell country artists what to sing about if I’m not going to go see a country show.
“If they bought tickets ever, maybe I’d listen. I don’t know. They’re just never there.”
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