The live audience offered scattered laughter, but viewers at home had much more visceral reactions.
Anti-vaccine proponents were delighted with Harrelson “red pilling the masses” and “speaking truth to power.” His joke referenced a pervasive conspiracy theory that pharmaceutical companies control the government and the media, and that they’re forcing the public to take unnecessary vaccines. The actor, who described himself as an “anarchist, Marxist, ethical hedonist, nondiscriminatory empath, epistemological deconstructionist and Texan,” immediately began receiving accolades from people who oppose coronavirus vaccines.
Others criticized Harrelson — and SNL for airing his remarks. “Thank you, @nbcsnl, for Woody Harrelson’s insipid anti-vax monologue. Who are [you] going to have guest host next week, Scott Baio? Rob Schneider? Kevin Sorbo? Maybe invite Kanye back while you’re at it,” wrote Twitter user Lee Goldberg. Another viewer asked: “Does #SNL think just harmless noise? Normalizing #antivaxx conspiracies does real harm!”
Harrelson is not the only celebrity to land himself in hot water for seemingly promoting vaccine mistrust. Earlier this month, “Shazam!” star Zachary Levi responded to an anti-vax tweet asking, “Do you agree or not, that Pfizer is a real danger to the world?” with, “Hardcore agree.”
I just read Woody Harrelson’s monologue. I guess I’m not a good sport, anymore because I don’t find anti-vax jokes funny while we lost a good chunk of America due to stupid people spreading it to others.
— Brown Eyed Susan (@smc429) February 26, 2023
Before the conspiracy theory portion of his monologue, Harrelson promoted unity, saying: “This country seems so divided. Beautiful, ugly; Black, White; blue, red. I love everybody, maybe because I’m a redneck hippie.”