Comment by jml78 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by jml78 | Hacker News Reader

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Here is how I took it. I watched it the day it came out before I read the outrage.

I am a southern raised white male. I have seen Dave live. I HAD been a fan of his stuff. I had some issues with his comedy in the past but nothing that made me avoid it.

However, this special rang different to me.

This special felt the same as white dudes I have heard my entire life. White dudes who would say racist shit and turn around to say they aren’t racist because they have black friends.

I felt Dave did the exact same with his trans friend. He used that friendship to try to shield his comedy.

Look, Dave doesn’t need our money. He doesn’t need any fucking person supporting him. Dude has so much money it doesn’t matter. So I do wonder why so many people are so desperately trying to defend transphobic comedy routines?

Stand away from the comedian and take a stand on what Dave’s actual views are. Own them yourself and defend those views. I think in 20 years you will look back and realize you held shitty views or at least society will

What his views are? That he was deeply upset his trans friend committed suicide, that he feels it was at least partly because she defended him online, that Twitter sucks and people do things there they would never in life, that he made a trust for Daphne’s daughter, that he is against bathroom laws, that he used his platform to try and stop the bullying of people with social media, that he is a true advocate for free speech? IDK, maybe he is a complex person and maybe you disagree, but I can’t find the monster.

> I think in 20 years you will look back and realize you held shitty views or at least society will

I think my views 20 years ago were near exactly what they are now. What if it’s yours that change? Then was Chapelle ok again?

What if your or my or his opinion doesn’t matter and everyone should be free to have their own and that is just ok even if someone else thinks it’s wrong?

By your post you justify that racism is ok because people should just accept people should be free to have ideas. I agree, they can have those ideas but they aren’t free from the consequences of having shitty ideas.

Yes I believe people can change.

As for his views, he straight up said he was a trans exclusionary radical feminist.

He said it multiple times in the special.

Go look at what that means. He is AGAINST legislation for trans rights. This is no different than white people saying we didn’t need the black civil rights movement.

Let me put it another way, my mom is an old white women who was alive during integration of the schools. She is racist as shit. She has a black friend. If her black friend dies first, she will absolutely be at her friend’s funeral. She loves her black friend. My mom would say her friend is “one of the good” ones. My mom is straight up racist. Having and caring about an individual in a group she is racist against doesn’t mean she isn’t racist.

Dave cared about his friend. He cares about his family. But he said what he is. No one put those words in his mouth. He said he was a Terf

> He is AGAINST legislation for trans rights.

Anybody who is FOR legislation of "rights" predicated on a non-falsifiable self-proclamation is almost certainly an idiot.

I don't dispute that gender dysphoria is real, it most certainly is. I don't dispute that living this way in a world that doesn't acknowledge who you are is a real bummer.

But advocating for legal recognition of a person's declaration, a word that cannot be objectively falsified, is absolutely a recipe for disaster. For every legitimately gender-dysphoric person, I bet there is a sexual predator rubbing his hands in anticipation for access to womens' spaces. And by what standard can the legal system deny them?

And why stop at gender? What stops me from falsely identifying as Black in order to qualify for scholarships or other programs intended to correct societal imbalances? By what right does a legal system that accepts the premise of subjective declaration as truth stop me from claiming Tribal casino profits or squatting on indigenous land?

It is the very height of idiocy to believe that a system of laws could possibly rest upon non-falsifiable claims.

Does it suck to live with identify disorders of any kind? Yes, absolutely. But should we upend our entire value system of objectivity of law in order to address it? Hell no.

This is a perfect explanation of why ”I’m living my truth” and post-modernism is completely incompatible with a functioning society.

Holding gender critical beliefs isn't at all similar to racism.

With racism, the racists are denying other people's humanity, based on race. That ideology centres around the notion of a group of humans being somehow subhuman.

This isn't the case with 'terfs' - they're not denying or diminishing anyone's humanity, they're simply saying that whether you're a woman or a man is determined by your biological sex, rather than a proclaimed gender identity.

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