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Saturday Night Live‘s “Weekend Update” gave a spotlight to a newcomer on Season 50, in Emil Wakim, who used his time to unpack young people’s support for Gazan and Palestinian people.
During the segment, co-host Colin Jost invited Wakim, who is Lebanese, to the table, where he tested his stand-up material in front of a live audience, including a bit about why a talking point previously uttered by Bill Maher against Chappell Roan won’t fly with Gen Z. (Multiple polls showcase Gen Z views are more pro-Palestinian and less supportive of U.S. actions, with young people more likely to classify the conflict as a genocide.)
“I don’t think people are being honest with stuff over there,” Wakim said. “Like a lot of young people now that are for gay rights and women’s rights will be like ‘Free Palestine, free Gaza,’ and then people on the other side are being like, ‘Oh, gays for Gaza, huh? Go be gay in Gaza, see how they like it over there. That’s why we’re going over there.’ As if that’s why America goes to war, because we love women and gay people so much? Also, if you want them to be gay, just stop bombing them — they’ll get to gay. Like, they’re busy. They don’t have time to be like, ‘Who am I in the deepest parts of my soul?’ You can’t watch your village get blown up and be like, ‘I think I’m bisexual actually.'”
Elsewhere during his appearance, Wakim, who has family in Lebanon, made jokes about his upbringing as a Christian Arab and dealing with his now-conservative immigrant father.
“He made it so hard that he’s a Republican now,” he said. “That’s the real American dream, dude, to go from village in Lebanon to being like, ‘No, no don’t let more in. No, sorry about that, no, sorry, white guys only. C’mon Kyle, let’s go play pickleball.'”
Wakim continued, admitting that his father worries about him openly talking about his identity.
“He’s like, ‘You know, you don’t have to say we’re Arab — we’re not Arab; we’re Christian Lebanese, it’s different. We’re European, we’re like the French,'” Wakim said, mimicking his father’s accent. “And I’m like, ‘Ask the French if they think we’re the French.'”
Speaking to the complexities of growing up Christian as an Arab person, Wakim added, “No matter how liberal or conservative of an area I’m in, when people find out I was raised Christian, people just relax a little bit. Even in this room … They’re just like, ‘Oh, he’s cool.’ They’re just a little less afraid of you. Christian Arabs, we’re like Black dudes with anime backpacks.”
Before signing off, he concluded, with a couple quips: “What is an Arab but a Greek that you’re kind of afraid of?” and “We’re spicy Greeks.”
But “Weekend Update” didn’t conclude without an appearance from Sarah Sherman, who was invited by Jost to comment on the return of the Victoria’s Secret runway show, following a six-year hiatus. While the featured player commended the lingerie brand’s inclusivity with body types, she had one gripe: They’re all perfect 10s!
“Where are my Midwest 4s at, you know what I mean? Where are my normal girlies at? Where are my girls with anxiety hives and infected belly button rings?” Sherman questioned, impassioned, with her self-described “resting rabbi face.”
And another thing! Sherman said she wanted to see “real underwear” at the show: “I want to see tired, cranky, busted bitches in real underwear. The kind you buy in packs of 12 at CVS, the kind the hospital gives you after a C-section, OK? I want to see underwear that’s been through hell and back, Colin; the kind that looks like a flag at the end of a war. The kind where when you throw it on the ground at the end of a long day it’s like dropping an everything bagel cream cheese side down,” she said.
But she saved her most fervent pitch until the segment’s closing, saying, “Listen up Victoria’s Secret … you made me feel insecure long enough and I got one thing to say to you: Please let me be in your show! I’ll change everything about myself: I’ll wax, I’ll bleach, I’ll power-sand my backne right off, I’ll do anything Colin, I’ll even make new holes. I’ll get that BBL you’ve been offering to pay for.”
