Mike Birbiglia used his platform on Wednesday night to urge his fellow comedians to speak out about Jimmy Kimmel’s late night show being suspended indefinitely.
In an Instagram post captioned, “Calling all comedians,” the stand-up comic succinctly explained why free speech is important — and also why it’s important to protect it on both sides.
“I’ve spent a lot of time in public and private defending comedians I don’t agree with,” Birbiglia wrote. “If you’re a comedian and you don’t call out the insanity of pulling Kimmel off the air — don’t bother spouting off about free speech anymore.”
Funny people such as Padma Lakshmi, Hannah Pilkes and Alex Edelman supported his message on IG, while other celebrities like Ben Stiller, Wanda Sykes and Jean Smart echoed his sentiments in social media posts of their own.
Kimmel’s show was put on pause due to his comments from Monday night’s episode about Charlie Kirk’s shooter.
“We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them and doing everything they can to score political points from it,” he said.
“Jimmy Kimmel Live!” hasn’t been canceled, but ABC also hasn’t announced its plans for the show going forward. Meanwhile, Nexstar intends to air a Charlie Kirk special on its 200 owned or partner stations in the timeslot on Friday.
