Dave Chappelle: Lion, Lion-Tamer or Lion Chow?
Dave Chappelle (Netflix)
I saw a monkey eating a banana in a suburban backyard when I was 12 years old, bicycling randomly through Chicago’s North Shore.
That incident came to mind when thinking about comedian Dave Chappelle and his conflict with some in the LGBTQ community, which has put Netflix in a corner.
Chappelle is neither the monkey nor the banana. Bear with me.
Seeing the monkey that day was odd, but not as odd as you might think. For me, the North Shore was something that might be covered by National Geographic: an exotic, threatening place ruled by strange and scary rich people.
I was genuinely afraid of getting off the bike there, worried someone would instantly discern that I didn’t belong, and call the cops. Or maybe just set their dogs on me.
I had no idea what to expect. There might as well be monkeys.
I had been passing through west Wilmette that day, and heard zoo-like noises coming from behind a seven-foot masonry wall. Curious but wary of getting off the bike, I pulled alongside the wall and peered through an eye-level slot.
That was when I saw the monkey. It was a few feet away, gnawing at its banana, regarding me calmly through the same slot.
Off in the distance, there was some kind of walking bird, like a peacock or ostrich, or maybe a giant pigeon.
(Give me a break. It was hard to see through the little slot.)
I stood on the bicycle seat for a better, over-the-wall view. That didn’t work, so I hitched myself up and sat on the top of the wall.
I looked out over a huge yard. I saw groupings of strange plants. But no big birds. No monkey, no banana.
I somehow developed the courage to go over the wall so I could check the place out. As I went over, I looked down and saw something strolling on the lawn that was much more surprising than the monkey.
A big tawny head, big furry feet, a tail. Eyes the size of cue balls.
“Holy shit. It’s a fucken lion.”
Unfortunately, my weight had already shifted, and gravity was committed to dropping me into the yard. I was about to commune with a creature twice the size of Dick Butkus and even better at biting people.
I spun around in mid-air and snatched wildly at the wall. My fingertips adhered to the surface like those of a gecko, and I was up and over and probably pedaling away before the beast cranked its big ugly head around.
As I said up top, I thought about this incident — perhaps surprisingly — as I considered the fix Netflix is in with Chappelle. Some transgender folk in and out of the company have maintained that his show “The Closer” is transphobic and hurtful. They’re trying to force it off the streaming service. Hundreds of Netflix employees walked out Wednesday to try to make that happen.
“Hurtful” seems to be the term used most often by Chappelle’s current detractors. But if his words are personally hurtful to anyone, they can avoid being hurt by not watching his show, just as I could have avoided the terror of the big cat by not going into its yard.
Chappelle thinks it’s funny that being hurtful should be enough to get yourself canceled. At one point in the show, he noted that the rapper DaBaby (Jonathan Lyndale Kirk) made an “egregious mistake” ripping gay people on stage July 25, which quickly became an act of career suicide. He added, “DaBaby killed a nigger in Walmart in North Carolina. Nothing bad happened to his career. Do you see where I’m going with this? In our country, you can shoot and kill a nigger but you better not hurt a gay person’s feelings.”
I’m convinced that humor is about hostility. Some humorists mainly use hostility toward themselves, but most are hostile toward other people and things. They may riff in a good-natured way, but they’re still being hostile.
If Chappelle’s show incites violence or significant disrespect against transfolk by people who watch it, it’s too hostile.
I’ve seen “The Closer” three times, and I don’t think it does that. Chappelle doesn't really even touch the most sensitive transgender issue of recent years: detransition of gender affirmation surgery (do-overs). Others have been accused of being transphobic for just bringing up the subject.
But Chappelle certainly doesn’t treat the transgender community with kid gloves, either.
He has apparently decided to go over the wall, knowing and appreciating that a big gay cat with a mouthful of big gay teeth is in the yard. He intends to tame it.
I think he wants to break the back of a special interest group with an underdeveloped sense of humor. Maybe it doesn’t matter which special interest group. He let both Jews and Asians have it in the mush in the same show.
He seems to want to take away the ability of a muscular movement to have its way with people who dare to disagree with it.
Who else could do that? Who else would? Does Chappelle have the intestinal fortitude to see it through?
He might. Chappelle may now be America’s most potent and popular comic. He faces the LGBTQ group, which has relatively quickly become the toughest non-commercial special interest group there is. It has left canceled corpses all over New York, Hollywood and Washington.
It’s power against power.
Chappelle can’t possibly weaken the LGBTQ movement to the point that it’s actually weak. It’ll never be weak again, thankfully. But he might hamstring its ability to bully.
Should he? Maybe we’ll find out. I would guess only a relatively small segment of the LGBTQ community even cares much about Chappelle now, but it looks like the game is afoot with those who do. If they keep the comedian in their sights, they could eat him alive. They obviously think he’s the bully, not them. Maybe they’re right.
He notes that he’s rich and famous. But there’s a limit. He’s just one guy, and it’ll take a lot of courage for a liberal to defend Chappelle. It’s easy for a guy like Joe Rogan, who makes hay out of being a jerk. With friends like him, Chappelle should prefer enemies.
I thought Chappelle made his intention clear at the end of “The Closer,” in an apparent invitation to jawbone, extended to the community.
“I’m not going to tell another joke about you until we are both sure that we are laughing together.”
Maybe that surety will come. Both sides would have to give something up. Or one of them will just give up, period.
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