Skip to Content

On Monday, CBS did not air the Mike & Molly season finale due to a storyline that somewhat mirrored the Oklahoma tornado tragedy.

Now, the Disney Channel pulled an episode of Jessie for another reason entirely:

It involves a few jokes made at the expense of a character who can only eat gluten-free recipes.

Wrote the network in a statement on Facebook late last week:

 

“[W]e received your feedback about tonight’s Jessie episode which some of you accessed early on Video-on-Demand. We are removing this particular episode from our regular programming schedule and will re-evaluate its references to gluten restrictions in the character’s diet. Please accept our apologies for the upset this episode caused you and your family.”

Disney was forced to act largely because a Change.org petition stated that the gluten-intolerant character was depicted as “annoying, sniveling and demanding, repeatedly teased and excluded by the other children.”

The online document asked the channel to “stop using gluten-intolerance as an excuse to bully children with any disease, disorder or disability.”

In 2011, meanwhile, Demi Lovato also called out her former employer for making light of eating disorders.

Do you think Disney should have axed this episode?