Minnesota Venue cancels Dave Chappelle for being ‘the safest space’

First Avenue, a concert venue in Minneapolis, Minnesota, canceled a scheduled performance by comedian Dave Chappelle, just hours before he was due to take the stage.

The venue explicitly cited criticism from progressives, who view Chappelle’s platform as an act of violence against the transgender community, given his jokes about that group.

“To the staff, artists and our community, we hear you and we are sorry,” a First Avenue spokesperson wrote in a statement. “We know we have to hold ourselves to the highest standards, and we let you down.”

The statement goes on to describe the First Avenue sites as “the safest spaces” in the country.

“We believe in diverse voices and freedom of artistic expression, but in honoring this, we lost sight of the impact it would have,” venue organizers noted.

We hear you. Tonight’s show has been canceled at First Avenue and is moving to the Varsity Theater. See our full statement for more. pic.twitter.com/tkf7rz0cc7

— First Avenue (@FirstAvenue) July 20, 2022

First Avenue can invite and uninvite whoever it wants, of course. But it’s hard to see anything other than cowardly and counterproductive in this decision.

For one thing, canceling the performance doesn’t even achieve the narrow goal of keeping Chappelle from speaking. As the statement states, the performance was simply being moved to another venue – and all ticket holders will be able to watch it there. If there ever was an example of virtue signalling, this is it.

Again, is it really virtuous to punish an actor for engaging in transgressive artistic expression? First Avenue never thought so. The place is featured extensively in Prince’s film, purple rain, and was known for promoting artists who challenged boundaries and flouted social convention. Today, First Avenue is afraid to offend a small number of hypersensitive progressives.

The Cancel-Chappelle crowd is likely vastly outnumbered by the crowd who think trying to silence the offensive comedy is a dumb proposition. Indeed, First Avenue is likely to receive even After negative attention now while simultaneously securing Chappelle himself a bigger crowd, more attention, and new material. There’s a Streisand effect to all of this: lame attempts to put Chapelle in trouble are too weak to succeed and, in fact, only make him a bigger star.

“The more you say I can’t say something, the more urgent it is for me to say it,” Chappelle said in his recent Netflix special, what’s in a name? “And that has nothing to do with what you say I can’t say. It has everything to do with my right, my freedom of artistic expression.”

Netflix, which employs Chappelle and recently added an “artistic expression” policy to its employee handbook, has the right: if you’re bothered by provocative material, maybe the entertainment business isn’t. not for you.