<p>“Yes busdriver you are correct. I should have written words and actions.”</p>
<p>That’s a relief, tom! You always make so much sense, it would confuse me greatly if you deviated from that.</p>
<p>Pretty much the only redeeming feature of this tawdry story and over the top public reaction is that I got to read this amazing blog post: [An</a> Open Letter to Paula Deen | Afroculinaria](<a href=“http://afroculinaria.com/2013/06/25/an-open-letter-to-paula-deen/]An”>An Open Letter to Paula Deen – Afroculinaria)</p>
<p>It, and the rest of the material on Michael Twitty’s site, is more than worth your time.</p>
<p>I skimmed the thread and didn’t see this mentioned so I’ll add my two cents. Paula Dean employs a lot of people and many people will lose their jobs as her empire constricts. This corporate mob mentality doesn’t just hurt Paula. It punishes many “innocent” people.</p>
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<p>sax and zoosermom you both nailed it. I dont understand what has happened to traditional media. Instead of giving people factual information they give us their opinions. All I want are the facts I can draw my own conclusions.</p>
<p>Props to Anderson Cooper. I knew I liked him!</p>
<p>[Anderson</a> Cooper: ‘Why Does Alec Baldwin Get a Pass Using Gay Slurs?’ Conservative ‘Would Be Vilified’ | NewsBusters](<a href=“http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2013/06/28/anderson-cooper-why-does-alec-baldwin-get-pass-using-gay-slurs-conser#ixzz2XYMYypbd]Anderson”>http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2013/06/28/anderson-cooper-why-does-alec-baldwin-get-pass-using-gay-slurs-conser#ixzz2XYMYypbd)</p>
<p>Deega you hit the nail on the head. Entrepreneurs employ a lot of people. We know that Paula Deen Inc. employs many black people and as former president Carter said, her foundations are known to help a lot of black people. But it is ok to do actual harm to actual people when a white trash woman has to be shown her place because that is what is really important. And it is also ok for Alec Baldwin to threaten violence and slur a historically abused group because he shows up at fancy parties that raise money to throw other fancy parties where people in the correct speaking in crowd can congratulate themselves on their wonderfulness.</p>
<p>But. While I think some of this is blown up because we like to be inflamed, if any racist comments had been ignored because, after all, she does this right or that, we’d still be in a pickle.</p>
<p>None of it, on balance, is easy.</p>
<p>“I am not trying to play the racist card here but how many of us remember a word said 20 years ago once? I sure don’t ; that makes me believe that the N word was part of her vocabulary and that is why she was warned by her sons not to use it.”</p>
<p>You misunderstood the context. In a deposition it is common to ask “have you ever” as a way of setting a trap to find an example at any point in your life that you might have forgotten so as to destroy the credibility of all you testimony. She would have been told that if there is any possibility that you could have used this work in any context at any point in your life the only true answer is yes. Had she quoted someone else in outrage she would still have had to answer yes. Yes or no questions provide no context. Remember that if someone ever sues you and threatens to destroy your life, this is how it happens. The plaintiff here stated a goal of destroying Paula and did so. Every other livelihood destroyed is simply collateral damage. The people at the publisher, the tv production people who are now unemployed,he lawyers, accountants, secretaries, marketing people. The people who work for and benefit from her charitable contributions. I think the media profiled Paula. They couldn’t conceive of the fact that a vulgar, fat white woman from the south was actually an Obama supporter. But she was.</p>
<p>Woah…social polarization. :rolleyes:</p>
<p>MirabileDictu: Thank you for the link in #209. Adding it to my blog list.</p>
<p>^ I am not sure what presentation her attorneys were aiming for, but it backfired. Nice, older entrepreneur, willing to admit past lapse or two? I wonder if the miss is that our expectations of a woman whose backstory is hard work, were not met.</p>
<p>If she could have pointed out actions she had taken, we might easily allow that she couldn’t manage every iota of her operation, that she delegated. But the overall “oh, these things go on” re: Bubba, jokes, words, is in contrast to her image. It doesn’t satisfy. That, I think, is a big part of the fail.</p>
<p>That, I think, was also a big part of the Martha fail: how a supposed control freak could miss something wasn’t kosher.</p>
<p>I don’t think Paula’s attorneys were in on initial damage control. It seems like she did that on a solo, amateurish basis.</p>
<p>Paula Dean is getting more ***** than Alec Baldwin and the others mentioned is that she is Southern. Let’s face it, there’s a lot of anti-Southern sentiment among those in the North and in the large cities. It’s seen here at CC with statements like “I don’t want my child to go to a college in the South”. There is a lot of stereotyping of white southerners and Paula Dean stepped into it.</p>
<p>On the other hand, Alec Baldwin is a northerner, a ‘cool’ guy, cool with the media honchos in NYC. He gets a pass.</p>
<p>It’s amazing to me that certain people who have done things, rather than merely said them do not get shunned by the media. </p>
<p>Roman Polanski (he of the underage girl sodomy)
Jesse Jackson (who admitted to spitting in white people’s food)
Anthony Weiner
Chris Brown</p>
<p>Woody Allen gets a pass for becoming intimately involved w/ a young woman/girl who is basically his stepdaughter, but the traditional media are apoplectic about Paula using the N word.</p>
<p>The press here is treating Weiner like he did something adorably naughty. Had he whipped that thing out on the subway he would have been arrested. I have a son. He has not cured cancer, nor has he brokered world peace. He is a young teenager and sometimes is a moron. We try to talk to him often about actions and consequences, particularly with regard to technology. Seeing someone lead in the polls after doing exactly what we warn him about confuses things. My son also saw the coverage of a local girl who was slut shamed and expelled in her senior year for the same thing. Paula shouldn’t have used the word, but her career and the livelihoods of so many shouldn’t have been destroyed as a result.</p>
<p>And don’t assume all northerners are knee-jerk anti-Southern. Sheesh.</p>
<p>The other thing is fear. I don’t think anyone is physically afraid of Paula Deen but the same cant be said of Alec Baldwin.</p>
<p>Seems to me the reaction by the companies that are dropping PD is the free market at work. </p>
<p>If the voters in NYC are appalled by what Weiner did he won’t get elected. If they are not, he might get elected. This is how it should work, imo.</p>
<p>I don’t think so Emilybee. The book was at number one on amazon when it was dropped. That is the opposite of the market at work.
As far as the polling, with the range of buffoons and incompetents running for mayor, people probably support Weiner because they are intimately familiar with him. Or they are waiting to see what his next nonsense will be. He has been out in my area a lot and he really is a gigantic personality, unlike Christine Quinn, who is so unobtrusive that if you didn’t know who she was you might not notice her.</p>