Local woman starts petition after SNL heroin skit

HUDSON, Mass. — A local mother struggling with addiction says she is furious with a skit that aired this weekend on Saturday Night Live.

Renee Cotton says her stepson is a recovering heroin addict currently in rehab, so when a fake commercial for “Heroin AM” came across her screen she reached out.

"As a mother who has to watch my addict suffer it hits a chord. I'm not OK with it,” she said.

Cotton even started a petition on change.org to have NBC and SNL apologize for the commercial and in just one day it has more than 7,000 signatures.

"SNL crossed the line, they need to apologize they need to acknowledge they were insensitive," she said.

She says the fake ad makes light of the current opioid epidemic, minimizing the seriousness of the drug and its addictive nature and makes fun of the pain caused by heroin addiction.

“I know Saturday Night Live can be a bit of a button pusher, they're good at poking fun at certain things like politics and war, but I just thought this was very insensitive and affected a lot of people that are really struggling right now,” she said.

FOX25 reached out to NBC for comment and while they have not issued a statement they did acknowledge that they are aware of the petition.

Cox Media Group