Joy Taylor Rips Shane Gillis’ SNL Joke That Women “Dress Like Whores” at the Gym: “How a Woman Dresses Is Not Bait for You to Approach Her, for You to Attack Her”

Joy Taylor said she wasn’t offended by Shane Gillis’s Saturday Night Live joke about women dressing like “whores” at the gym; however, she found it lazy.

“If you’re going to be on SNL, put some thought into your fucking monologue. And it just wasn’t funny,” Taylor said on her podcast Two Personal.

SNL shared a clip of Taylor’s reaction on X on Wednesday and linked to the full episode, which addresses not only Gillis’ monologue but other current affairs as well. The former Fox Sports 1 host joined many entertainers and commentators who criticized the monologue, whereas others online defended it as an observation.

Shane Gillis hosted the October 10 episode of the NBC sketch show with musical guest Rosalía. It was his third time hosting since SNL fired him in 2019, days after naming him a cast member, as clips from his podcast containing racist and homophobic statements appeared. He returned to host the show in February 2024 and March 2025.

Most of his roughly seven-minute monologue focused on himself, his weight problems, and his return to workouts. He said that the New York public gym is hell for a fat guy, and then switched to the women he saw there.

“I haven’t been to the gym in so long I didn’t know women just dress like whores now?” Gillis said, prompting groans and scattered laughter from the studio audience.

He then described the tight shorts in bright colors, comparing them to artificial fishing bait, and warned men not to stare because women film their workouts. He made jokes that he must be in the background of hundreds of TikTok videos.

Gillis apologized during the closing goodnights for mistakenly swearing during a Green Eggs and Ham sketch earlier in the show. He has not addressed the gym joke yet, and, through a representative, declined to comment on Monday.

In her podcast, Taylor repeated the premise of the bit “women are dressing like whores now,” and then asked, “Like what’s, what’s the joke?”

She rejected the idea at the center of the bit: that revealing gym clothes are meant to attract male attention. Replicating Gillis’ own comparison, she argued that a woman’s outfit does not invite anyone.

Taylor objected to the idea that a woman’s clothes are an invitation to men to approach, attack, assault, or harass her.

However, her objection is not to the subject itself, but to how the joke is built.

“There are so many problematic elements in how he built that joke,” she noted. “I’m not outraged or offended by it because he’s performing comedy in a comedy setting. But I’m outraged by how lazy and poorly done it was.”

Taylor proposed a solution for men who notice women’s attire in the gym: shut up and stop commenting.

“What you’re supposed to do is mind your business. What women wear has nothing to do with you,” Taylor said. “Why aren’t women whores when they’re in bathing suits? They’re in far less clothing than.”

Then she turned the joke around.

“I mean, I see some imprints on men when I’m at the gym. I see some shorts that are a little too short and a little too tight during your squats. And I’m not saying anything,” she said.

Using the slang term for promiscuous people, she continued: “Hose is what they are. I’m minding my business. Hose. Hose for the streets. For the streets.”

“Having your d*ck dangling in the gym is so crazy. I mean.”

Taylor drew on her own experience to criticize the joke online comments about her body and gym harassment.

Taylor worked for years as a Fox Sports 1 host, including on the debate show Speak. She now hosts Two Personal, which started in 2024 and presents itself as a candid talk about culture, relationships, and hot social issues, as well as “The Daily Play with Joy Taylor.”

The full episode titled “Shane Gillis’ SNL Joke About Women, Trump’s Press Secretary Gets DRAGGED and What Really Turns Us On” includes not only the discussion of Gillis’ joke, but other news and relationship issues as well.

Taylor’s criticism joins a wave of pushback since the episode’s release. Dan Levy, known from Schitt’s Creek, appeared in an Instagram video saying that “women wearing short shorts at the gym do not make them whores” and encouraging men to speak up. Ego Nwodim, former SNL cast member, shared a gym mirror selfie with the caption “Whore reporting for duty,” and singer Maren Morris posted a similar workout video.

Phoebe Robinson criticized the routine in her profane post, calling it lazy, hack material and a disguise of contempt for women as humor. Jessica Valenti, a feminist writer, pointed out that Gillis appeared to make jokes about the time when the nation was having a conversation about sexual assault due to allegations against members of a Cornell University fraternity. Women posted clips of themselves working out in the same short shorts that Gillis made fun of, and Gymshark launched a campaign with Megan Thee Stallion just a few days after the episode.

However, others defended Gillis, saying he was making jokes. Victoria Jackson, who was an SNL cast member from 1986 to 1992, told Entertainment Weekly that she liked the monologue and that Gillis was “right about gym girls.” Online defenders of Gillis said that the bit was an observational humor about a trend, and SNL’s Michael Che joked on Instagram that every question about his new special would now be about Gillis.

Gillis touched upon the topic before. His Netflix comedy series Tires featured a similar gag about a man unable to look away from women at the gym.