The Dead Names #17: Daphne Dorman

A medicalized trans identified comedian and father ends his life weeks after notable career highlight.

Daphne Dorman was a 44 year old trans identified comedian who was promoted by comedian Dave Chapelle. He transitioned in the wake of the birth of his daughter, which led his wife to divorce him, which led him to make bitter jokes about her during his stand-up routines. A few weeks after being promoted by Chapelle, he chose to end his life, leaving a note that I find infuriating to read.

At the time of his death, Dorman had just received a positive shout-out and encouragement to continue comedy from Dave Chappelle. He had been fully affirmed and to some extent, medicalized. Yet, he still chose to end his life. What role did hormones play in his deranged thought process that led to this act of self-annihilation?

I try to be compassionate with these responses, and I do have compassion for suicidal people - even the annoying ones. To an extent, we are all at the mercy of our meat robotics, and if the meat sauce ain’t saucing, it’s anyone’s guess what comes next. IYKYK, and if you’ve never experienced it, it’s likely a matter of time before you do. Illness gets the best of us. I do not entirely know what precipitated his choice, just that he’s the one who made it, on some level, after years of red flags.

But still, his note made me so angry to read. It's hard to sympathize with a person so sick in the head, he would tell other people to help his young daughter understand why she wasn't worth enough to make dad choose to keep being alive. Suicidal people - the mentally unwell kind, not the rational assessment kind such as people deciding to jump from burning buildings or skip worst parts of dying of cancer - have a pathological selfishness about their thought process that causes me to feel anger, which is just the way I react to the grief of knowing someone else feels that way about their immediate future. And you need to make room for the uncomfortable parts of grief.

His daughter will never understand that it was not her fault. It will be an open question for the rest of her life, given her age. Young children feel omnipotent. She will suffer trying to understand why he abandoned her. It's beyond comprehension. Dad prioritized a paraphilia, being told it was an innate identity by peers and medical authority figures and celebrities - and then he self-deleted rather than be there for her. I feel terrible for her loss.

Please, if you're struggling with such thoughts, seek help. If it helps, just remember I’ll judge you if you die. So you had better not.

Here's his stand-up comedy that included calling his ex wife and mother of his child “a dick” publicly for leaving him after he started down this path, not long after she had given birth. He deserved real help, real insight into why these socially toxic behaviors were suddenly so compelling it was worth blowing up his life. The phenomenon of men going balls to the wall and into the trash, simply due to proximity to women experiencing pregnancy hormones, really needs to be studied so it can be predicted. There has to be some explanation for the womb envy going on here.

Another suicide prevented by male breast implants and a gaff.