Hosts of “The Breakfast Club” radio show – Photo: The Breakfast Club, via Facebook.
“This transphobic, homophobic rhetoric is not funny and does not deserve a platform.”
–A Care2 petition demanding that iHeartRadio drop the show The Breakfast Club after hosts Charlamagne tha God, DJ Envy and Angela Yee allegedly laughed at a joke by comedian Lil Duval that he would kill a woman he had been dating if he found out she was transgender.
“I don’t care. She dying. You manipulated me into believing this thing…In my mind I’m gay now,” Lil Duval said of the hypothetical situation when he appeared on the show last Friday. He also referred to transwomen as “boys.”
Audio shows the hosts then interjected and tried to explain that he couldn’t threaten to kill transgender people, with Charlamagne tha God saying it would be a “hate crime,” though he also opined that transgender women should tell men about their gender identity before becoming romantically involved or face legal consequences for not doing so.
The Care2 petition claims that the show has a “long history of peddling ignorant, homophobic, transphobic, sexist content.”
Pointing to the rising numbers of anti-transgender killings over the past few years, the petition also notes that Lil Duval’s comments come the same week that Dwanya Hickerson pled guilty to stabbing and killing Mississippi nurse Dee Whigham last summer. Whigham, then 25, was found in a hotel with 115 stab wounds, the majority covering her face. Her throat was also slashed three times.
“Transwomen like myself face the threat of violence every single day we step out into the public, just as a consequence for living our truth,” Sarah Rose, Care2’s LGBTQ Issues Advocate and the author of the petition, said in a statement. “The Breakfast Club’s dialogue is another unfortunate and sick example of humor made at the expense of a subjugated, derided minority that our media is all too happy to applaud. My hope is that this Care2 petition sends a clear message: advertisers and businesses should not stand for advocating violence and hate crimes.”
Following the airing of its show with Lil Duval, the hashtag #BoycottBreakfastClub started trending on Twitter and social media.
On its Monday show, the cast defended their actions, saying that they had chastised Lil Duval for his comments, and that they should not be held responsible for his comments.
“I think it’s clear, if you listen to the whole entire interview, you can hear that none of us were like, ‘Yes, Lil Duval, that’s what you should do,'” Yee said.
“We condemned it!” interjected Charlamagne.
“I understand the hurt for that community, with things that have been happening, so I’m not going to take away from how they feel about it. But I just want to make sure it’s expressed that we have never, in any way — we didn’t say those comments, and we didn’t agree with them,” added Yee.
The hosts and several of their callers also said that the show has been very LGBTQ-friendly over its run, and has even hosted transgender guests like author Janet Mock.
Reports that the person who fatally shot conservative activist Charlie Kirk had left behind bullet casings engraved with phrases espousing "transgender ideology" have been debunked.
The rumor spread quickly after conservative commentator Steven Crowder posted to X on the morning of September 11 -- the day after the shooting -- claiming he had received an email from a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives officer describing such engravings.
Crowder shared what he said was an email from an ATF officer claiming investigators had recovered the weapon used in Kirk's killing, with one spent cartridge in the chamber and three rounds still in the magazine. The email further alleged the cartridges were engraved with "transgender and anti-fascist ideology."
A new survey finds that many LGBTQ Americans -- especially transgender and nonbinary people -- have altered their lives in response to a wave of anti-LGBTQ laws and rhetoric sweeping the country, with many reporting serious harm to their mental health and overall wellbeing.
Conducted from May 29 to June 13 by NORC’s AmeriSpeak panel for the Movement Advancement Project, the online survey polled 1,055 LGBTQ adults nationwide, including 111 who identified as transgender or nonbinary.
Operated by NORC at the University of Chicago, AmeriSpeak is a probability-based panel designed to reflect the U.S. household population. Randomly selected households are contacted through mail, email, phone, or in-person interviews.
More than 9 in 10 LGBTQ adults are out to someone in their lives about their sexual orientation or gender identity -- yet many remain closeted when it comes to family members or co-workers.
According to a Pew Research Center survey conducted in January, 96% of LGBTQ adults say they have told someone about their identity, while only 3% say they have not come out to anyone. However, up to one-third of LGBTQ adults -- including those who have come out to “someone” -- say they are not out to extended family members, such as grandparents, aunts and uncles, or cousins.
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“This transphobic, homophobic rhetoric is not funny and does not deserve a platform.”
–A Care2 petition demanding that iHeartRadio drop the show The Breakfast Club after hosts Charlamagne tha God, DJ Envy and Angela Yee allegedly laughed at a joke by comedian Lil Duval that he would kill a woman he had been dating if he found out she was transgender.
“I don’t care. She dying. You manipulated me into believing this thing…In my mind I’m gay now,” Lil Duval said of the hypothetical situation when he appeared on the show last Friday. He also referred to transwomen as “boys.”
Audio shows the hosts then interjected and tried to explain that he couldn’t threaten to kill transgender people, with Charlamagne tha God saying it would be a “hate crime,” though he also opined that transgender women should tell men about their gender identity before becoming romantically involved or face legal consequences for not doing so.
The Care2 petition claims that the show has a “long history of peddling ignorant, homophobic, transphobic, sexist content.”
Pointing to the rising numbers of anti-transgender killings over the past few years, the petition also notes that Lil Duval’s comments come the same week that Dwanya Hickerson pled guilty to stabbing and killing Mississippi nurse Dee Whigham last summer. Whigham, then 25, was found in a hotel with 115 stab wounds, the majority covering her face. Her throat was also slashed three times.
“Transwomen like myself face the threat of violence every single day we step out into the public, just as a consequence for living our truth,” Sarah Rose, Care2’s LGBTQ Issues Advocate and the author of the petition, said in a statement. “The Breakfast Club’s dialogue is another unfortunate and sick example of humor made at the expense of a subjugated, derided minority that our media is all too happy to applaud. My hope is that this Care2 petition sends a clear message: advertisers and businesses should not stand for advocating violence and hate crimes.”
Following the airing of its show with Lil Duval, the hashtag #BoycottBreakfastClub started trending on Twitter and social media.
On its Monday show, the cast defended their actions, saying that they had chastised Lil Duval for his comments, and that they should not be held responsible for his comments.
“I think it’s clear, if you listen to the whole entire interview, you can hear that none of us were like, ‘Yes, Lil Duval, that’s what you should do,'” Yee said.
“We condemned it!” interjected Charlamagne.
“I understand the hurt for that community, with things that have been happening, so I’m not going to take away from how they feel about it. But I just want to make sure it’s expressed that we have never, in any way — we didn’t say those comments, and we didn’t agree with them,” added Yee.
The hosts and several of their callers also said that the show has been very LGBTQ-friendly over its run, and has even hosted transgender guests like author Janet Mock.
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