Comedian Blasted For Hurling Racist Slurs As ‘Humor’ At Texas Show

A comedian is facing serious backlash after a short video of him telling appallingly racist jokes at a recent show started making the rounds.

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Peng Dang shared the offending clip to Twitter, noting that he was tasked with introducing fellow comedian Tony Hinchcliffe during a comedy show in Austin, Texas, last week.

While it’s not uncommon for comedians to roast a peer introducing them, Hinchcliffe jumped straight to brutal racism, with not a single attempt at a joke in sight.

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“Welcome, hello,” he says to the audience. “How about one more time for the filthy little f—king ch—k that was just up here? All you f—king race traitors are hooping and hollering, I’m back there watching you, puking in a f—king bucket.”

While that apparently wasn’t even the end of Hinchcliffe’s trite decision to be racist for laughs at that show, it was more than enough for people to share the clip far and wide as an example of the kind of bigotry that still passes as “edgy” in some comedy circles.

Tony Hinchcliffe Tony hinchcliffe
Doing racist Doing regular
Hate speech Stand up

“What’s even the joke here” https://t.co/yP40XZnIVI

— conntent mcnett (@conner_mcnutt) May 11, 2021

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Not gonna share the clip but Tony Hinchcliffe is 1) unfunny and 2) scum. No jokes in there at all, just pure racism. Fuck him.

— matt apodACAB (@mattapodaca) May 11, 2021

For years, every so often, a different non-comic friend in LA would text me to say they would never go back to the Comedy Store and they wanted to know if I knew the shitty dickhead comic responsible.

Every time I would say “lemme guess: Tony Hinchcliffe?”

I was always right. https://t.co/aHZxodjmVD

— if I were a cop I would simply eat gun, go to hell (@andy_sell) May 11, 2021

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One time during the comedy fest in Vancouver, a comedian texted me to say I HAD to come to the venue they were at to see someone bombing worse than anyone ever has in history and when I got there it was Tony Hinchcliffe yelling at the crowd about not getting it.

— Prank Stallone (@theCJS) May 11, 2021

Of course, that hasn’t stopped some of Hinchcliffe’s fellow comics from coming out to defend him, claiming the clip is lacking context (as if any context would justify it) or crying about how people just don’t get comedy anymore.

So Tony Hinchcliffe’s racist bros are coming out. As this guy points out, racism (because that’s what it is) is apparently allowed to thrive on @OnLocals’s platform. So now we know where the racist comedy assholes are hiding. Way to go, @OnLocals. pic.twitter.com/NpT9HwsOTC

— Liz Hsiao Lan Alper (@LizAlps) May 12, 2021

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But as many pointed out, there were ultimately no jokes in Hinchcliffe’s racism. This wasn’t an attempt to try out a new bit that simply fell flat, or pushed some boundary too far — it was pure cruelty, for cruelty’s sake. 

Shit like this is an attempt to marginalize comics like @pengdangcomedy to the audience and industry, to ensure that white straight boys are the only viable stars and headliners. Before you worry about Tony getting cancelled, realize that Tony was working hard to cancel Peng.

— Guy Branum (@guybranum) May 11, 2021

Kath is correct. A huge mistake I made coming up as a standup was thinking that there was any kind of honor system among Tony Hinchcliffe-type dudes that extended to people who weren’t also straight white guys. It’s not about protecting comedy, it’s about protecting their own. https://t.co/sEeCBWqMHt

— Samantha Ruddy (@samlymatters) May 11, 2021

In the coming days people will decry the backlash against Tony Hinchcliffe being cruel to his MC Peng as “cancel culture.” They’ll say nobody can take a joke. There was no joke. No misdirection. No wink. Just anger he has to share the stage with someone who isn’t a white guy.

— Samantha Ruddy (@samlymatters) May 11, 2021

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In memory of Hinchcliffe’s career, another clip has started circulating in which he took aim at another comic and was shot down with brutal humor that was actually funny not one, but twice.

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*First Published: May 12, 2021, 6:14 am