Stephen Colbert spent his entire Monday episode of The Colbert Report on the #CancelColbert Twitter hashtag, which was launched after the Comedy Central show’s Twitter page sent out a tweet some found offensive.
Colbert made fun of the situation, noting that it was wrong for that tweet to be sent out, but he explained how he’s not racist. After all, he doesn’t see race. “People tell me I’m white. I believe them, because I just spent six minutes telling people I’m not a racist…and that is about the whitest thing you can do,” Colbert told his audience last night.
Monday was the first chance Colbert got to respond to the outcry on television, since his Thursday episode was filmed before the hashtag went viral.
Colbert was trying to make a point about Washington Redskins owner Dan Snyder’s foundation for Native Americans, which still kept the offensive “Redskins” name. In a sketch Wednesday, Colbert said, “I am willing to show #Asian community I care by introducing the Ching-Chong Ding-Dong Foundation for Sensitivity to Orientals or Whatever.” That was tweeted by the Report’s page, which Colbert has no control over, with no context or even link to the sketch.
“Who would have thought a means of communication limited to 140 characters would ever create misunderstandings?” Colbert said Monday, notes EW. “When I saw tweet with no context, I understand how people were offended.”
As Deadline notes, he also spent time on how much attention the media gave the story. Even CNN broke away from its Malaysia Airlines stories.
Twitter co-founder Biz Stone also appeared on the episode to “blow up” the Report page. “When you founded Twitter, did you do it just to attack me?” Colbert asked Stone.