It’s mighty good of you to stand up for your favorite cooking celebrity. The Food Network is evidently more interested in advertising revenue than fans. She’s a goner at Smithfield Hams, and QVC is on the fence, of course, because they sell Paula Deen merchandise to fans.
Food Network has wiped her off the planet. Even though she shows up on the show lineup, they substitute Giada or Ina or even some of the newer faces. For the newer faces this must be a break they’ve never seen before! Every couple of hours Paula was on with her butter and mayonnaise, and now a newbie gets a shot, even the adorable Pioneer Woman!
Some people never strive to do anything, others attain minimal qualifications and jobs to match. Others go on to middle management and a very few who keep striving every day may get their fingers stomped on by the guy the next rung up on the ladder and make it to the top. Some of those, even though they are not in politics, become what the law calls public figures.
No papparazzo would want to take a picture of me, but he couldn’t publish it without my consent. If I were Justin Bieber, he could take the photo and publish it. Such was Paula Deen. I say was because even though she’s raised two children, run a successful business and become a TV chef I don’t know if she can dig herself out of this one. It may be better for her to retire gracefully and ride that boat down the river and perhaps change her hair color.
Don’t ever think that racism is gone in the USA, north or south. Political correctness has its failings, especially when someone is forced to write s/he. To my knowledge I have never used the N-word except to tell someone of an offense and still I believe I said N-word. When I was a kid the word was Negro, then Black, then African American, you go with the flow.
What got me was the wedding plan with African American men dressed up as slaves. That is in such poor taste that nearly 150 years after the end of slavery, it is unconscionable to even contemplate such an event, but I’m a Northerner.
For a public figure to use these terms and plan such an event affects her sponsors, employers, and fans. There is a larger group of people who are offended by her comments, they’re called the American people who may or may not be familiar with the silver-haired, silver-tongued Southerner, but after the past week everyone will know who she was. I bought a pound of butter today, Paula, and thought of you. Dee
p.s. Do you have Martha Stewart on speed dial?
Cooking with Dee 