Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos gave an interview about his stance on the comedy specials on Netflix. It has become a contentious issue of where to draw a line in the comedy. The comedians themselves have revamped their conscience on where to draw the line. Nevertheless, recently, the two famous comedians Ricky Gervais and Dave Chappelle came under fire for their humor. Ricky Gervais released a new special ‘SuperNature’, where he used “punching down” jokes about trans individuals.
Some days back, Dave Chappelle made a special appearance during SNL star John Mulaney’s show, and the attendees were not happy with the anti-LGBTQIA+ humor. He was also heavily criticized for his pro-TERF (Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminists) comments during his special ‘The Closer’.
This led to many employees walking out as a form of protest. In the light of free speech, Netflix released a dubious memo implying the employees “be prepared to work on content you may not agree with.” In a recent interview, Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos has given his response to the recent controversies in the comedy space.
“Figuring Out Where The Line Is, Is By Crossing It Once In A While”: Ted Sarandos On Recent Controversies
On Sunday, Executive Ted Sarandos sat with the New York Times for an interview. The graph of Netflix has not been impressive. The streaming platform has seen a dip in subscriptions as low as 200,000.
Specifically in the US and Canada, Netflix lost 430,000 subscriptions. The platform has axed or discontinued certain shows due to a lack of remuneration.
As a result of this, the company had to sack many of its employees. The interviewer asked about the $54 billion loss of stock in April. Ted referenced the novella ‘Typhoon’ by Joseph Conrad. Sarandos addressed the loss of subscriptions due to “outdated information.”
In the same interview, Maureen Dowd touched upon the Dave Chappelle controversy regarding his ‘The Closer’ special. In 2019, The Hollywood Reporter reported the statistics about the non-fictional comedy specials.
The OTT giant revealed that 75 million of its subscribers watched a comedy special. In total, there are six Netflix specials of Chappelle on Netflix. However, in 2021, his special ‘The Closer’ upset the LGBTQIA+ community, especially the Trans community.
In his special, he called gender “a fact.” In defense of J.K. Rowling, he said, “They canceled JK Rowling. My God! Effectually she said gender was a fact, the trans community got mad as s**t, and they started calling her a Terf… I’m Team Terf. I agree, man. Gender is a fact.”
During the interview, Ted said that he was surprised to see the extreme reactions. According to him, “the only way comedians can figure out where the line is, is by crossing the line every once in a while. I think it’s very important to the American culture generally to have free expression.”
The executive continued, “We’re programming for a lot of diverse people who have different opinions and different tastes and different styles, and yet we’re not making everything for everybody. We want something for everybody but everything’s not going to be for everybody.”
Ted expressed that his stance helped him to put his principles to the test. He said, “It was an opportunity to take somebody, like in Dave’s case, who is, by all measure, the comedian of our generation, the most popular comedian on Netflix for sure. Nobody would say that what he does isn’t thoughtful or smart. You just don’t agree with him.”
Elon Musk And Ted Sarandos Stood By Ricky Gervais’ Recent Special Amidst Heavy Criticism
The ‘Afterlife’ actor who is known for his explosive humor faced the brunt of his new comedy piece. Ricky received heavy backlash from the LGBTQIA+ community for his punching down humor in his special ‘SuperNature’.
In his special, he addressed trans-woman as “new women.” He continued, “They’re great, aren’t they? The new ones we’ve been seeing lately. The ones with beards and cocks. They’re as good as gold, I love them.”
He also addressed the separate toilet issues for trans individuals. He said, “And now the old-fashioned ones say, ‘Oh, they want to use our toilets.’ ‘Why shouldn’t they use your toilets?’ ‘For ladies!’”
He went to the extent where he expressed the possibility of a transwoman “raping” the imaginary individual. Nonetheless, the British comic cleared the air and said, “In real life of course I support trans rights. I support all human rights, and trans rights are human rights.”
He continued, “Live your best life. Use your preferred pronouns. Be the gender that you feel you are. But meet me halfway, ladies. Lose the cock. That’s all I’m saying.” Ted said in the interview that the same logic as Dave Chappelle applies to Ricky.
Both Gervais and Chappelle received a heavy backlash for their homophobic and transphobic content. Twitterati reacted to the specials.
Ricky Gervais has a new stand up show out on Netflix today.
5 minutes in and he’s making jokes about trans women attacking & raping people in public bathrooms. To him we exist only as a punchline, a threat, something less than human.
— Esme (@discount_Ripley) May 24, 2022
After watching Ricky Gervais new special on Netflix
He jokes about
Rape, pedo’s, religion and God, Adolf Hitler, every race, disabilities, mentally ill, cancer patients, AIDS and obviously trans
Honestly he’s being inclusive not exclusive. He leaves NO ONE OUT
BRILLIANT
— ULTRA MAGA Merica (@MericaMadness) May 30, 2022
#DaveChappelle is a vile human actively attacking minorities who are already a target of constant harassment.
And #JohnMulaney is as disgusting for actively supporting, platforming & exposing his audience to this type of derogatory ambush and verbal abuse. pic.twitter.com/k46Vn50Npj
— Ray-ney Day (@SarcasticCatBoy) May 22, 2022
John Mulaney deadass built his career thanks to queer teens/young adults turning his comedy into common quotes and memes, and he turns around and shits in their faces by bringing Dave Chappelle to one of his shows, tacitly endorsing his comedy and jokes
— k a t h e r i n e ? (@sapphoswamp) May 22, 2022
One user wrote, “If you’re a comedian and you support trans people it’s your responsibility to be speaking out against Dave Chappelle and the new Ricky Gervais special. At this point, you can’t call yourself an ally if you’re not publicly taking a stand against it. it’s the bare minimum.”
Elon Musk, the soon-to-be CEO of the microblogging app Twitter has provided his two cents on the issue. On Sunday, Republican Rep. Conor Friedersdorf tweeted the audience and critics metric of the Gervais’ special ‘SuperNature’ and wrote, “The decoupling of critic and audience scores for standup specials is a thing to behold.”
The “critics” seek not to critique, but rather to virtue signal. They are out of touch with the people and so lose their credibility with the people.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 29, 2022
In the tweet, the South-African billionaire wrote, “The “critics” seek not to critique, but rather to virtue signal. They are out of touch with the people and so lose their credibility with the people.” When Netflix released the memo, Elon touted it as a “Good move.”
Also Read: Elon Musk Vs AOC: Left-Leaning Director David Weissman’s ‘Phony’ Poll To Discredit Musk Backfires
