Comic and podcaster Marc Maron ripped into Netflix for its refusal to face with the trans group, arguing that the streaming platform’s determination to air Dave Chappelle’s comedy specials exhibits “how fascism works in business.”
“Fascism is good for business,” Maron mentioned on Sunday’s episode of “Pod Save America.”
“Like Netflix,” he continued. “Netflix will just co-opt anybody that can take that algorithm. I used to do a joke about it. Netflix can become ‘Reichflix’ very quickly.”
Maron mentioned the “pivotal moment” was when the trans group and allies criticized Netflix for airing comic Dave Chappelle’s 2021 particular through which Chappelle made transphobic jokes. Netflix staff organized a walkout to demand the particular be taken off the streaming service, however finally, Netflix CEO Ted Sarandos refused to take away this system.
Maron mentioned Netflix realized the trans group wasn’t going to have an effect on its backside line.
“That is how fascism works in business,” Maron mentioned.
Netflix didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark. Shortly after the controversy in 2021, Sarandos mentioned that Netflix tries to “support creative freedom and artistic expression” and that he would classify hate speech as “something that would intentionally call for physically harming other people or even remove protections.”
Maron acknowledged that Netflix has a strong catalog with some LGBTQ+ exhibits and films, however argued that these exhibits and films don’t get the “big deals” or get renewed.
He added that at this time’s gifted comics are working “in the shadow” of what he referred to as “tribalized comedy,” calling out Joe Rogan particularly as “the arbiter of what comedy is.”
But when “woke is dead,” Maron continued, then anti-woke comics can’t “claim the victim mantle” anymore.
“What do you have to keep beating these people up for?” he requested. “Some of them are losing their rights. Some of them are being literally killed. Some of them are being deported, and these are all the big funnies for you guys who claim to be victims of this horrible policy. So then, why not stop now?”
Maron has been crucial of comedians who had President Donald Trump on their podcasts in the course of the lead-up to the 2024 election. In Maron’s 2025 HBO particular, he joked that if Adolf Hitler had been alive at this time, the Nazi dictator would most likely seem on comic Theo Von’s podcast. Maron then dove into an impression of Von.
Maron mentioned on “Pod Save America” that he had to consider that joke earlier than together with it as a result of there’s a stigma round being crucial of one other comic.
“The impression was good enough,” Maron mentioned. “The jokes I put [in with] him talking were funny. I’d be hard-pressed to think that he didn’t think it was funny.”
Maron was additionally crucial of comic Invoice Maher, who steadily criticizes politically appropriate or “woke” moments in tradition. Maron mentioned that he’s “always had a problem” with Maher’s “tone” and his “desperate chasing of relevance.”
“[It] kind of makes the whole undertaking feel desperate,” Maron mentioned of Maher.
Maron hosts the “WTF” podcast, which is ending its run within the fall after 16 years.
