Stand-Up Comedian Gets #Cancelled for Making Joke About Dead Rapper XXXTentacion

You might think that in 2019, only white males like Louis CK and Johnny Depp can get #cancelled. But a young stand-up comic named Dina Hashem is proving that women of color can also be targeted by the roaming outrage mob. And she didn’t even sexually harass anybody. She just told a joke that hurt some people’s feelings.

Recently she made this joke about the rapper XXXTentacion, who was shot and killed last year:

Dina Hashem & Comdey Central are clowns 🤡 for thinking that was acceptable to treat XXXTentacion that way, this was ridiculous, i’m glad I’m in a position to call out this bs from corporations disrespecting groups they believe don’t have the power to stand up for themselves. pic.twitter.com/cepqHXyKJ0

— DomisLive NEWS (@domislivenews) July 20, 2019

“Is anyone still mourning XXXTentacion? He’s a rapper who was murdered. He’s dead now. He was shot. He was on his way to buy a car with $50,000 in cash and somebody shot him and took the money. Which is very tragic… but I also think it would be a very good Venmo commercial. That’s the first thing I thought when I heard that. Like, ‘I don’t have Venmo, I should get Venmo.'”

Now XXXTentacion’s fans and colleagues are angry, and they’re doxing Hashem and sending her death threats. Comedy Central put up a video of the joke, but has now taken it down. Hashem has protected her Twitter account and apparently deleted her Facebook account, but she did post this on Instagram:

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Dina Hashem (@dinahashem_) on Jul 19, 2019 at 7:17pm PDT

Hashem didn’t shoot the guy. She didn’t even say it’s funny that he’s dead. She just made an observational joke about the wisdom of carrying enormous sums of cash on your person, especially now that we have things like Venmo.

It’s an incisive, well-crafted joke. Hashem is a comedian. That’s what she’s supposed to do. Her job is not to make people feel safe and comfortable. Her job is to make people laugh. If you’re not one of the people laughing, then don’t listen to her. It’s the easiest thing in the world. Just go do something else. She’s not responsible for your feelings. That’s your job.

Having said all that, this other XXXTentacion joke is very offensive and I am thoroughly outraged.