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Janet Mock Says ‘The Breakfast Club’ Used Her Image As a ‘Prop’ and Folks Weigh In

Posted byBy Kiersten Willis | Published on: CommentsComments (0)

Janet Mock isn’t happy about the way “The Breakfast Club” reacted during a discussion about trans women and now others are chiming in on her claim that the show’s hosts used her as a prop.

The transgender rights activist voiced concern Monday, July 31, over the follow-up to comedian Lil Duval’s answer that he is “probably going to want to kill” a trans woman if he had sex with her without knowing she was trans.

DJ Envy held up Mock’s book, “Surpassing Certainty,” and co-host Charlamagne Tha God urged Duval to admit the activist was pretty during a Friday, July 28, interview.

“The hosts laugh after using my image as a literal prop — just days after I was a guest on the same show — for laughs, vitriol and a deeper call and justification for violence,” Mock wrote Monday on Allure magazine’s website. “Just so we are all clear: On a Black program that often advocates for the safety and lives of Black people, its hosts laughed as their guest advocated for the murder of Black trans women who are Black people, too!”

The hosts had been laughing before Duval’s assertion, but when he made the controversial remark, Angela Yee and Charlemagne disagreed and the latter noted what the comic said was a hate crime.

Still, Mock took issue with Duval’s statement, saying he “purposefully misgendered me (as the hosts laugh, thereby co-signing) in an attempt to put me in my place and erase my womanhood.” Charlemagne was the only host who laughed when Duval said Mock was “doing his thing,” while Yee told the guest to stop.

“Their fragile masculinity would not allow them to recognize a simple truth: I am an accomplished, beautiful Black trans woman,” Mock wrote of Charlemagne, Envy and Duval. “Your willful ignorance will not stop me from being exactly who I am. My sisters and I are here and we exist, and you will not diminish our light and our brilliance.”

Online, many disagreed that the radio show hosts were mocking the TV host.

Others backed Mock.

https://twitter.com/sailor_marcury/status/892070343174705153

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