Some of Dave Chappelle's comedy makes me cringe. It can sometimes be very difficult to hear, to sit through objectively. I've admittedly had to watch some of his controversially critiqued Netflix comedy specials more than once in order to parse through the nuance; the purpose; the intent.
When his most vociferous critics and detractors first took issue with the big corporation's 'so-called' negligence, in light of his recent release, 'The Closer', it left me with much to think about, but probably not what his detractors expected.
The fact is, as a black man living in the heart of America's racial animus, someone who has some historic awareness relating to the confluence of the Civil Rights Movement and its intentional and successful co-opting by the LGBQT+ Movement(which, in my opinion, wasn't to be negatively criticized, but serves as proof positive that the tactics employed by the likes of Dr. M. L. King Jr could, too, have been successful, if he, amongst other assassinated and discredited human rights leaders and educators, had been allowed to live; however, there is this, 'He(Eric Cervini, a historian and author of “The Deviant's War”)said he uses the word “plagiarism” to describe how (Frank)Kameny(co-founder of the Mattachine Society in Washington, D.C., one of the first homophile groups ("homophile" being the adjective of choice at the time) used civil rights tactics without working with or crediting the activists whose tactics he used. “You are using and borrowing tactics from another movement, but not giving proper credit and not making space for people at the intersection of those two movements,” Cervini said. “I think it raises the question of the moral acceptability of that.”)
https://www.nbcnews.com/feature/nbc-out/different-fight-same-goal-how-black-freedom-movement-inspired-early-n1259072
I've met an approximation or two of a Dave Chappelle at various points throughout my life. They spoke uncomfortable truths; held me firm in their gaze while dissecting my suppositions; my accepted beliefs and expectations; offended with their inarguable truths.
They weren't funny, though. They didn't care to soothe their delivery with wit and humor.
They just cut me up, looked me up and down like I was short and shredded my comfortable positions with direct and vicious honesty.
I know what point Chappelle is trying to make. I keep waiting for his critics to also acknowledge that he is actually trying to make a point, that it has nothing to do with their right to enjoy the basic benefits of a human's right to live.
In fact, as he explicitly states, over and over, he is an advocate for one's right to live as they choose. He is a proponent of the right to a decent “human experience” for everyone.
That doesn't save any of them from being the punchline of a good joke, though.
I think about his earlier related tale of the TV exec who chastened him for using the word 'fa**ot' in a sketch, but couldn't see why the word 'ni**er' would be problematic for the censors.
Ni**er was fine. Fa**ot crossed the line.
This would resonate more for me if I didn't know that it is the Black, the Latino, the Asian, Pacific Island members of the LGBQT+ community that bears the brunt of the intolerants' dangerous hate.
They are the one's who are publicly vilified, hunted and ridiculed and outright killed to protect the rights of whites who can easily duck behind their ethnic privilege. White's who could avoid the extremists' violence by simply putting their hands in their pockets and whistling Dixie--
Inelegant. As I initially said, some of what dude said made me cringe, not everything, but the intended effect, perhaps it was purposeful.
Whatever. It was inelegant, nonetheless.
Regardless, what I left with was in fact a greater degree of tolerance, of understanding for the struggles, the plight of those within the Transgender community.
I connected with the relationship he shared with his friend. I laughed at her jokes, as related by him. I choked up at her pain, at the suffering she experienced, the conflict, the hatred, the lack of empathy.
I laughed, too.
Some of that shit, well, most of it, was funny.
The kind of funny that is needed after a tragedy, a wake or a funeral, not dismissive, but an acknowledgment, a way to find a permanent place in your heart for the loss, the hurt.
It can't survive alone there, in the heart, the pain would become too overwhelming. It also needs to abide alongside the laughter, to remember that there is still laughter out there, running wild in the world, lighting up the dark places.
Maybe the idea of a rapper's career only thriving after he murders another black man here in America is comfortably accepted by a desensitized populace, while his immediate evisceration is expected when he verbally offends the LGBTQ+ community, but that don't make it cool.
And, maybe, just maybe, it just goes to show that our priorities really are unaligned--
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