Tiffany Haddish has addressed a viral moment from her stand-up performance at this weekend’s Netflix Is a Joke Festival, where she called out the protests happening on college campuses against the ongoing Israel–Hamas war.
When speaking to TMZ in a video on Monday, Haddish acknowledged the response to her comments and said, “I think if they are going to protest for one place they should protest for all the places that are having genocide happening. How many Black people got to die before we can get a protest? … If you want to protest? Protest. But if you really want to be effective and make change, go up to the legislation office, go up to your Senator, call your council. Go to Congress. [Go to the people] who make change … it would be way more effective.”
In recent weeks, demonstrations and encampments have emerged at several universities across the United States, which have led to hundreds of arrests and some schools canceling their commencement ceremonies.
During her Netflix Is a Joke stand-up set, Haddish was captured on video sharing her thoughts on the campus protests. In a video posted on social media, Haddish can be heard saying, “I don’t give a fuck about that shit. I never went to college, why would I care about college?”
She added, “There’s not genocide at the college. I give a fuck about what’s going on, on the other side of the world, but why would I give a fuck about the college? … This the shit I’m talking about, stupid motherfuckers at the college. Ain’t never worked a goddamn day in your life.”
During her rant, Haddish also brought up the terrorist attacks that happened in the U.S. on Sept. 11, 2001.
“Do you remember 9/ll, bitch? … What the fuck did we do, America? … We went the fuck over there [and] we fucked they ass up, didn’t we?”
Earlier this year, the Girls Trip star had faced backlash when she visited Israel to learn more about the Oct. 7 attacks and their aftermath. She previously defended her decision, saying she “wanted to see with my own eyes.”
But in another social media video from the Netflix event, Haddish had more to say about her visit. “I went over there to Israel, it’s a gang of Black people that live there, and they Jewish, and circumcised … every religion is there! … Everybody was there,” she said. “Palestinians was there and they was telling me what it was like over there in Gaza and they was telling me how hard it is to be from there, and I was like, ‘Damn, you describing South Central L.A. on 10, bitch.’”
Haddish concluded, “It was crazy, and I’m very upset about the whole thing. I want there to be peace. We deserve peace; they deserve peace. Peace! And us over here causing turmoil over here don’t create peace. You know what creates peace? Take your ass over there.”
When speaking to TMZ about her stand-up comments, Haddish took issue with the protestors blocking Jewish students from attending class. “You at college and you blocking other people who worked their whole lives to go to school. They spent all these thousands of thousands of dollars to get educated and you blocking them from going to class? They not going to be able to graduate?” she said. “Do it, but do it better. Really be effective. Running around with a trashcan shield looking like you’re playing Dungeons & Dragons is not gonna change nothing. But what will change is if you get your education and you get yourself in office. You go and talk to those people that are in office.”
Haddish is currently on a press tour for her new book, I Curse You With Joy, out today, and she also visited The Breakfast Club radio show on Tuesday where she further addressed her comments.
“I went off because people were saying what they were saying, and they was like, ‘You got to support the colleges.’ And I’m like, ‘I don’t want to support people tearing up a school, and I don’t think that’s the way to go.’ If you really want stuff like this to stop happening, I think there are some better ways to go about making it stop,” she said. “Blocking people from going to class is not going to be the thing. I mean, that’s what the Nazis did. They blocked the Jews, they blocked the Jehovah’s Witnesses. They killed a lot of people. They didn’t just kill Jews, they was killing everybody.”
Reps for Haddish and Netflix have not yet responded to The Hollywood Reporter‘s request for comment.
Jackie Strause and Tatiana Tenreyro contributed to this story.
