Fox News Panel Hits SNL For Elon Musk Joke ‘Mocking Free Speech’: Writers ‘Might as Well Walk Across the Hall’ to Work for MSNBC
A panel on Fox News’ The Big Sunday Show slammed Saturday Night Live for a joke about Elon Musk making an offer to buy Twitter, panning the joke as mocking not just the SpaceX CEO but also “free speech.”
The joke aired during the Weekend Update segment, with Michael Che bringing up Musk’s multi-billion cash takeover offer to take the social media company private.
“That’s how badly white guys want to use the n-word,” joked Che, presumably referring to Musk’s public discussions of changes he might like to see made to Twitter’s content moderation policies.
“Saturday Night Live [was] seemingly mocking free speech last night while taking aim at Elon Musk’s attempt to take over Twitter,” said co-host Nicole Saphier. Musk had been “dominating headlines” recently, she added, for “vowing to change the social media platform to ensure freedom of speech” if his bid is accepted.
Saphier acknowledged that prior to this joke, Che and his co-host Colin Jost had told several jokes mocking Democrats, but “they are notorious for their right-wing criticism” and their joke about Musk “turned it into a racial issue.”
She turned over the discussion to Joe Concha, who she referred to as her “favorite media connoisseur.”
“I didn’t get the joke,” replied Concha. “White guys really wanna use the n-word so Elon Musk is now a racist? I didn’t quite get that but I don’t get Saturday Night Live lately in general.”
He continued, calling the joke “such a shame” because it was just “echo what we saw on CNN and MSNBC the entire week.”
“Free speech — more speech is a good thing,” Concha said, mentioning how he had “never missed an episode” of SNL during the “30 year stretch” during which the show featured iconic cast members like John Belushi, Bill Murray, Eddie Murphy, Dana Carvey, and Will Ferrell. The show used to be good, he said, because it was “unpredictable” but now “it’s become the one thing it can’t be and that is predictable.”
“The best comedies are built on surprise,” he added. “Being fearless, not being politically correct — and that’s what Saturday Night Live has become.”
“The writers down there might as well, just over at 30 Rock, walk across the hall and start writing for MSNBC instead of SNL,” Concha concluded. “Because it’s almost impossible to tell the difference at this point, Nicole.”
Watch the video above, via Fox News.