Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on a remark made on NBC’s “Saturday Night Live,” and addresses the flair up over comments made by Fox News host Jeanine Pirro:
“But if you support the Catholic Church, isn’t that like the same thing as being an R. Kelly fan?”
That’s what Pete Davidson said on “Saturday Night Live.” In doing so, he libeled all priests. He did not compare the alleged predator to an alleged predatory priest—he compared Kelly to the entire Catholic clergy. His bigoted remark deserves to be condemned by everyone.
Should Davidson be fired? That’s a drastic action, one suitable for (a) those who make comments that are so serious and injurious that anything less would be unacceptable and (b) recidivists. Because we are not aware of any anti-Catholic comments that Davidson has previously made, we are not calling for his dismissal. But executives at NBC need to talk to him without delay. If he strikes again, our response will be different.
Regrettably, the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the Catholic League analogue in the Muslim community, is asking Fox News to fire Jeanine Pirro for comments she made about Rep. Ilhan Omar on the same night that Davidson made his remark. CAIR did not cite a single previous instance where it objected to Pirro.
From our perspective, if there is a comment that is so egregious as to be completely indefensible—a 10 on a scale of 1 to 10—then calling for a TV host or entertainer to be fired may be warranted. But when it does not reach that level, and there is no history of similar statements, then calls for dismissal are unwarranted.
Contact Lauren Manasevit, press manager for “SNL”: lauren.manasevit@nbcuni.com
