Standards and Practices at NBC Needs Some Practice

 There Goes the Myth About all the Jewish Writers

So, Michael Che is taking his time apologizing--assuming he ever does--for his anti-Semitic trope on Weekend Update on last week's Saturday Night Live. It went something like this:

"Israel is reporting that they vaccinated half of their population, and I'm going to guess it's the Jewish half."

Now, I don't know if Che wrote the joke, although he's one of four putative head writers on the show. Weekend Update itself actually has a staff of five writers, though it's safe to guess if Che didn't like the joke he wouldn't read it. He apparently liked the joke.

What's baffling--beyond why he'd find it funny (spoiler alert: it wasn't) --is that scripts are ostensibly still vetted by Standards and Practices before they hit the air. And they'd have not one, but two opportunities to knock it off, in dress rehearsal and before the live show. But it appears nobody got their girdles in a knot over this crack.

Which then begs the question of "why not?" And why has NBC and SNL gone quiet about this for four days, despite wide condemnation. Even the ADL hasn't been able to get a response out of Lorne Michaels. 

One more time: why not?

In other NBC anti-Semitic news, the network today did pull the finale from its streaming platforms of "Nurses," a series it imported from Canada, which stereotyped its way into ignominy. In it, a Hasidic man refuses a bone graft because it would come from a "goyim leg."

Oy vey iz mir.

Among those who went on the attack was the Simon Wiesenthal Center, which knows a thing or two about anti-Semitism. 

"Overreaction? Orthodox Jews are targeted for violent hate crimes -- in the city of New York, Jews are [the] number one target of hate crimes ... this is no slip of the tongue. It was a vile, cheap attack masquerading as TV drama."

As Deadline reported, an NBC source said the network was contacted by several Jewish groups about "Nurses" and was "keen to have conversations with them about the topic."

That's all well and good, but also disingenuous. NBC doesn't own "Nurses." It's a Canadian import that was used to plug a hole in its schedule caused by Covid. There are no plans to repeat the episode or bring "Nurses" back for another season. On the other hand, "SNL" is an NBC property. And on Che they remain silent.

They should know better. In broadcasting, nobody likes dead air.