Netflix CEO doubles down on "transphobia in media isn't harmful"

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
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The problem with this analysis is that policies are created and enforced by people. It’s not like the CEO’s hands are tied here. He’s the one deciding that this content isn’t intended to incite hate or violence, and he’s the one deciding that this is sufficient.

What he has done is say the special is not in fact harmful as a way to defend Netflix’s policy. He’s not at any point trying to separate his own opinion and what Netflix allows.

It’s not like this special hasn’t inspired hate. And Chappelle has himself talked about how bigotry in media inspires hate. So he knew that would happen. He did intentionally inspire hate.

Heck, his defense is to try and argue that his hate was actually targeted at white people, not LGBT people.

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Targeting hate at any set of people should be equally frowned upon.

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I’d say that Chappelle’s comments are dehumanizing towards trans individuals. The CEO’s assertion that that cannot possibly translate into real world harm is either naïve or deliberately obtuse.

Acts of violence are justified against dehumanized individuals, we’ve seen it used in war against our enemies, and we’ve also seen it used domestically against our fellow citizens.

No, but you would need to ignore the words that I actually used, and substitute a bunch of your own in order to come to the conclusion that that is anywhere near what I am arguing.

I said nothing about the general “offensive” and am talking about humor that is directed towards the denigration of groups. I know a whole lot of jokes, some of them even funny, that are highly offensive, and yet target no group as being fit for being put down.

Humor is an odd thing, and comes from expectations being subverted. Someone could very well laugh at a racist joke, but as long as they have the good manners to feel guilty about it afterward, they probably are not a racist.

However, if someone is seeking out bigoted humor to laugh at, if they are looking for validation in someone who demeans others and is looking for a laugh at their expense, then yes, I do think that that person is a bigot.

So yes, the fact that there are bigots out there that will consume media directed at bigots is not a good reason to produce or support it. It is enabling of bigotry, and profiting off of it is even more exploitative.

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Well…yes. Isn’t that what we are here for?

I’m sure something was lost in my translation of the OP’s interpretation of the media’s reporting of a few lines from Ted Serandos’s statement. Maybe he could have phrased what he was trying to say more politically. But the OP still feels very much like “I don’t like what I heard about this show and I’m upset that the CEO hasn’t addressed it to my satisfaction.”

So what’s your solution? Enforcement of some arbitrary standard of what is considered “objectionable”? Who decides this?

Sorry, which part of this is “straw”?

I read the OP. I guess I’m just cynical and assume that Netflix and it’s executives don’t really care about anything other than how viewership of programs translates into profits. I don’t hold much stock in statements made by CEOs and executives as most of it is bullshit anyway. In this particular case, not very good bullshit.

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What specific jokes or comments?

I didn’t see the whole show, but I recall Chapelle going on a bit about how much progress the LGBTQ community has made over the past few years, relative to Black people. The one part that I thought might be related to “promoting violence” is where he relates a story about a transgendered person starting a fight with him in a club, Chappelle thinking the person (who identified as a woman) was a cis-normal male, and almost getting his ass kicked.

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I guess you can’t control how you feel, but that is very far from what the OP actually expressed.

Not sure there is much more to be had on this line, as you seem to want to hold to your misrepresentation no matter what here.

Are you speaking legally or socially? Legally, I don’t think that there should be any enforcement for anyone that doesn’t cross the line into calling for violence.

Socially, I think that people can make their own decisions. Not watching the special is a bit of a boycott, it works against its ratings. Cancelling your Netflix account is a bit more of a protest, maybe enough will do so that they even notice.

But I’m not sure why you choose to go directly from someone expressing their disapproval to assuming that they want arbitrary enforcement. That’s just making a bunch of stuff up on your part.

Pretty much the part that starts at the beginning of your post, and goes all the way to the end. But even more specifically, where you claim that the OP, or anyone else in this thread, “think that his show (or presumably the service that streams it) should not exist because YOU found it offensive”. That’s something that you just made up out of whole cloth. And maybe your “feelings”.

Actually, we are in agreement there. And that’s the problem, they are putting profits ahead of the harm that could come from them. Ignoring externalities is the most noble thing a capitalist can do, very little different from polluting the rivers or the air in the name of profit. Not giving them money is something that I see no problem with. It’s the only thing that they understand, and if they find that they are no longer financially rewarded by producing bigoted content, then they will no longer do so.

If they were saying a bunch of useless platitudes, then I’d agree. But they are defending their decision, not based on the idea of freedom of speech, but on the assertion that this form of speech cannot cause any sort of harm in the real world.

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I quoted some when I quoted the Times article, and don’t really feel like scrolling up to quote when you could do your own homework, so I will only paraphrase here a bit when I say that he calls trans people fake, like veggie burgers, or like Dolezal, or that he is afraid of being tricked into finding a transwoman attractive. There are other comments along those lines, feel free to check them out yourself, maybe have a laugh if that is the sort of thing that you find humorous.

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The actual reason they said they weren’t pulling it was because it is not speech designed to intentionally incite hatred or violence. They additionally have some fairly stupid opinions based on video games and general crime rates that they believe is evidence it “does not translate to harm in the real world.” That opinion is stupid and wrong, but even if you remove it from their argument entirely you’re still left with what is essentially a standard of not banning speech for being offensive or harmful, but only banning speech that is a deliberate incitement to hate or violence.

I am curious where you would draw the line, without getting specific on a specific issue. Would you ban any speech from a platform that could be “harmful?” Because going back to my example with Taxi Driver, I can imagine, and most likely this has occurred–virtually any type of creative expression causing harm even if that’s not the intent.

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Right, but that creates a fairly wide scope. If I say that transwomen are abominations of nature, that god hates them, and that they aren’t real people, that’s not actually designed to intentionally incite hatred or violence either. It’s just my observations, sharing my feelings.

And that is what this thread is all about, that opinion that you agree is stupid and wrong. At least we are in agreement on that.

The question is whether people should act out against the CEO of one of the largest media companies holding and expressing such a stupid and wrong opinion when it comes to deciding what content to produce and promote.

Right, but removing it is then ignoring what the OP is talking about. The claim that it is not harmful is the entire point of it.

I don’t get where you guys keep coming up with this “banning” thing. Expressing one’s objections to something is not banning. Considering cancelling your subscription service is not banning. Even advocating to others to do the same is not banning. The only ones talking about banning in this thread are you and those who keep misrepresenting what the OP actually has said here.

But, if you are asking me where I draw the line on what I support, then I would not support material that denigrates and dehumanizes those who are already marginalized in our society. Chappelle can make all the jokes about white straight cis men he wants, and I’ll maybe even laugh at them. Start making jokes about people who are already the butt of too many of them, and I’m going to tune away.

How many people tried to assassinate a public official due to that movie? How possible would it be for someone to predict that a mentally disturbed individual would be inspired to act it out in order to impress a completely different actor?

It is very easy to predict that celebrating the denigration of marginalized populations will be enabling to a whole lot more people to feel free to at the least, repeat the jokes in the presence of those they know will find them unpleasant, and quite likely create enough dehumanization that discrimination and even violence seems justified.

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I mean who people do business with is functionally a private matter, I don’t give one whit if someone subscribes or not to Netflix as a personal business decision. Some people in this thread do seem to care whether or not OP sends money to Netflix every month, I do not.

How would you define: denigrate, dehumanize, “already marginalized” and “our society”?

If it is so easy to predict then you are asserting you would know, as a hypothetical platform owner, exactly what speech could cause harm?

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Just for fun, before I abandon this thread, I’ll try stating my philosophy of media in more detail, though I’m fairly certain half the posters in this thread will spend zero time thinking about what the words actually mean and start responding based on what opinions they feel the words are evidence of.

I think freedom of speech is important. The government in particular shouldn’t restrict speech except in extreme circumstances. (If you are a free speech absolutist feel you are correct that this means I disagree with you.)

I also think dominant media should be extremely careful in censoring viewpoints. In today’s world CNN, The New York Times, etc. can do just as much harm to free speech by setting arbitrary standards. On the other hand, government restrictions on speech are completely different from media restrictions. Media cannot, after all, publish absolutely everything all the time. If they did they wouldn’t be media, they’d be a hosting platform.

But here I was talking about media who are mainly about news and opinion. Netflix is mainly about entertainment. Sure, there’s no hard and perfect line there, but Netflix having stricter standard about what they consider harmful content isn’t restricting anyone’s free speech unless you think Netflix paying Chapelle $20 million to make his jokes is required by the first amendment while them not even sending someone to film Crazy Jack ranting from a park bench about the PTB secretly being lizards is just good business sense.

I have no interest in seeing Chapelle’s show. I have no idea if Netflix’s trans employees are super thin skinned and Chapelle is actually celebrating and normalizing being trans. All I know is that Netflix’ response has been fundamentally incompatible with the kind of media company I’m comfortable supporting with my entertainment budget.

Cue the strawman questions. (They will be free speech, but that doesn’t make them less dumb.)

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Not content with merely doubling down, Netflix has decided to triple down.

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What? While there is a high suicide rate among trans people, no where near half of all trans people take their own life.

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Yes, I misremembered that statistic I saw. It’s that over half of all trans people have contemplated suicide.

The number who attempt it, you’ll note, is only a measly 41%. (And, yes, that is obviously sarcasm.)

And guess what is the best way to prevent this?

So, while I thank you for the gut check of my statement, I don’t really think it in any way changes my underlying point. A comedian mocking trans people, saying he’s a TERF, saying that transitioning is equivalent to blackface, mocking their fucking genitals, and just otherwise trying to hurt them—that shit is fucking harmful, and it’s ridiculous that people want to pretend that you can solve it by just ignoring it.

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It’s not hard. Does it attack someone for an innate characteristic that makes them part of a minority?

Do the activists fighting for the rights the minority in question tell you that it’s harmful? Is there a consensus among that minority that it is harmful? Is there study after study after study proving that it is harmful?

I don’t get all this handwringing about all of this. It’s not like this is hard to determine. There’s a reason why those of us who actually listen to trans voices know that it is harmful. All you have to do is care enough to try and find out, rather than throw up your hands and say “who knows?”

I was going to respond to @msmith537 separately, but I’d have to repeat everything I just said above. I’ll just add the rest.

As you can see, there is nothing remotely arbitrary about any of this. You had a guy who said he was “team TERF” (the KKK equivalent for trans people), He mocked trans genitals. He argued that being trans was like blackface. He acted like he was “tricked” because he found a trans woman attractive. He mocked all the people who were hurt by JK Rowling coming out in defense of a TERF and arguing that trans women aren’t women. He made it out like he was the real victim, because a man wrote him a respectful letter about why why his jokes were harmful to trans people.

He practically said every hateful thing that trans people and allied activists have been decrying for decades now. It’s not like this is some little gray area. No matter how fuzzy the line is, this was definitely over it.

The one good thing I’ll say about Chappelle is that he promised to stop. Too bad he’s got all these fans defending him.

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Well, in Chappelle’s defense, he does what a lot of comedians do. He takes various circumstances, situations, and stereotypes associated with race, gender, sexuality, culture and whatnot, and exaggerates them to comic effect. And his particular style is to push the envelope as far as he can.

FWIW, I watched the whole special again last night. For the most part, it didn’t seem particular “hateful” towards the LGBTQ community (as far as I could tell). At least, it didn’t seem particularly mean-spirited. It mostly did seem like Chappelle bemoaning how he is perceived as “transphobic” from an act he did some years ago.

I suppose at the very least, it gets people talking about the topic.

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It’s a shame then that you’re more willing to make judgements and public declarations of personal decisions out of ignorance. I can’t know for sure, but I suspect that if you watch the show, you might find that your perspective and subsequent conclusions about Chappelle and why Netflix said what they said in a somewhat changed. Or maybe not. But at least it won’t be based on hearsay.

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Have you seen the show in question or are you just getting your information from opinion pieces you find elsewhere? Is it your understanding that Chappelle and Netflix have partnered to create humor targeted at bigots and with the aim of profiting from same? If not, what the hell are we talking about?

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Yeah, I should really watch a piece of entertainment that isn’t my thing (That’s how I feel about the majority of stand up) so that I can declare that actual trans people are wrong to tell their employer they consider it problematic and can side with their tone deaf CEO who stated outright that media representation doesn’t cause real world harm. I mean, who wouldn’t want to be more like you?

Netflix has now decided they consider it good optics to fire one of the organizers of the walk-out. Another reason for me to tell them “bye-bye, I don’t want to contribute to your profits”.

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You say it like it’s a bad thing.

Then don’t. We all have the right to choose how we spend our discretionary income and free time. But this conversation was never about your rights in that respect. It’s about whether you’re making a well informed decision about a highly topical social issue which you’ve inserted yourself into by making your opinion public. It’s highly likely that this kind of humor is not your cup of tea and watching the show won’t change your mind in the least. What’s a little obnoxious (and maybe even slightly toxic) is the underlying insinuation that people who disagree with your point of view, including Netflix management, are quite possibly bigoted in some way or at the very least enabling hateful bigotry.