Gilbert Gottfried has been fired from his job voicing the Aflac duck after a series of not-okay joke tweets about the disastrous quake and tsunami in Japan. Aflac released a statement Monday afternoon, saying that “Gilbert’s recent comments about the crisis in Japan were lacking in humor and certainly do not represent the thoughts and feelings of anyone at Aflac.” Lacking in humor — true. Also, way too soon. Example from Saturday: “I was talking to my Japanese real estate agent. I said ‘is there a school in this area.’ She said ‘not now, but just wait.'”
The offending tweets seem to have been pulled from Gottfried’s account, but too little too late! Here are some other examples of how not to tweet about Japan.
“Japan called me. They said ‘maybe those jokes are a hit in the U.S., but over here, they’re all sinking.'”
“Japan is really advanced. They don’t go to the beach. The beach comes to them.”
“I just split up with my girlfriend, but like the Japanese say, ‘They’ll be another one floating by any minute now.'”
Gottfried’s never particularly funny anyway (has he ever actually been in a movie, or does he just get paid to be shrill on TV sometimes?), but this is pretty bad — and compounded by the fact that Aflac is the number-one insurance company in Japan, pulling 75% of its revenue from that country. The company said they “will immediately set plans in motion to conduct a nationwide casting call to find a new voice of the iconic Aflac Duck.” If you have a convincing quack, now’s your moment.