A 2009 video depicting Rick and Morty co-creator Dan Harmon molesting a baby doll is coming back to haunt him. He has since deleted his Twitter account.
According to CNET, the video, titled Daryl, is a parody of the serial killer drama Dexter. In the video, Harmon breaks into a house and molests a baby doll, making it clear why the video has raised eyebrows across the internet. The video caught the attention of notorious internet scumbags 4chan, far-right bloggers and The_Donald subreddit.
Harmon, who created the NBC comedy Community and co-created Adult Swim’s wildly successful Rick and Morty animated series, has been no stranger to controversy for both the content of his series and his personal conduct.
Cartoon Network parent company Turner, as well as representatives for Harmon, didn’t immediately respond to request for comment.
Harmon’s departure from Twitter comes in the wake of Disney firing Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn for tweets he had made years ago making light of pedophilia and child rape.
The video, as Vulture reported in 2012, was removed without reason, but Vulture noted:
Unfortunately, Daryl has been taken offline for unknown reasons. I’m going to assume that it was a move by Harmon to keep unsuspecting NBC execs who hold Community’s fate in their hands from seeing the second episode, which may or may not have contained man-on-cat rape.
It’s an offensive sketch, but those who were aware of Harmon’s comedy and Channel 101, which often showcases risqué content, understood the humor. This was the same festival that helped other boundary-pushing comedy groups like Tim and Eric, The Lonely Island, Derrick Comedy and Human Giant break into the industry.
We’re hopeful there isn’t some sort of bounty on comedians. Granted, if there’s truly a risk to a person’s safety, such violent people or sexual predators must be stopped. That goes without saying. But if there’s a social justice movement to make everyone behave themselves per a certain set of rules and arbitrary decorum (which makes it so none of us are allowed to have a past), then we bid these words to the social media of everyone who ever said anything off-color.
Do you think the world of comedy is experiencing a man-hunt? A lady-hunt? A witch-hunt? With the Roseanne incident and James Gunn firing, is everyone going too far? Give Nerdbot your thoughts in the comments and get the conversation going!
