Dan Levy has spoken out against Shane Gillis’ highly criticized Saturday Night Live monologue in which he joked about women dressing like “whores” at gyms.
“Women wearing short shorts to the gym does not make them whores,” Levy, 43, began in an Instagram video on Sunday, October 11. “It makes the men calling them whores misogynists. There’s a difference there.”
The Schitt’s Creek alum added that he’s “seen more men’s nipples at the gym than I’ve ever seen women showing their bodies off.”
“But I’m speechless that something like that can exist on live national television,” he continued. “And to be perfectly honest, more men need to be standing up in opposition to it because it’s complacency that has created the environment [in] which women are sexually assaulted, and it’s a conversation as opposed to a crime.”
Levy then called for men to start “defending women more.”
“This is not a women’s issue. This is an everybody issue, because the more that men objectify women in the media, the more that other men see them as objects and treat them as objects,” he concluded. “They are not objects. They are superior human beings to men, OK? And I’m sorry if this gets me in trouble with the internet, but f***.”
Gillis, 38, made the controversial comments about women while hosting SNL on Saturday, October 10.
“I haven’t been to the gym in so long, I didn’t know women just dress like whores now?” he said. “Look, I’m sorry, there’s no other way to describe [it]. Have you seen it? I’ve seen it. You’ve seen the shorts? They’re those neon, like, artificial bait-colored [shorts], and the wrinkles go around the cheeks and all combine at the butthole. And don’t look! You’re not allowed to look.”
Levy received plenty of support from fellow celebs after his response on Sunday.
“We stan Dan 🫶🏼 Thank you,” actress Sophia Bush wrote, while her former One Tree Hill costar Hilarie Burton added, “Thank you!!!!”
Broadway actor Barrett Wilbert Weed commented, “I love you, Dan.”
Gillis has not publicly addressed the backlash for his comments.
Elsewhere during his SNL gig, Gillis accidentally dropped the f-bomb and later apologized for the flub. (The Federal Communications Commission has a list of seven words that can’t be said on television: s***, piss, f***, c***, c***sucker, motherf***er and t***. Those who break the rule may face fines, although it’s not currently known if Gillis and the variety show will be required to pay for the mistake.)
“Sorry about earlier,” Gillis noted at the end of the show. “Thank you very much. [I] had a good night.”
