Some news I just picked up from Publisher’s Lunch (I heard it on the radio this a.m., too):
Paula Deen has partnered with private equity firm Najafi Media “to build and grow her business, Paula Deen Ventures.” That new holding company has hired Steven Nanula from Paula Deen Food Company as ceo. The WSJ puts the investment at between $75 million and $100 million. Jahm Najafi says in the announcement, “We know that the enterprise will be successful and valuable, as Paula and her team continue to bring quality products and experiences to her loyal fan base.”
A few days ago, Deen was in Clarence, NY outside of Buffalo to celebrate the opening of her retail headquarters, which houses the Paula Deen Food offices and a retail store for people for her products and foods.
You do not want to spend your money on Paula Deen products. Here is why:
She is a racist.
Whenever there’s a flurry of scandal of the kind that flurried Paula Deen, I read the apologies, the explanations, the pseudo-historical references … and I snort. Because anyone who could at any time — and especially in a public way — make a racist remark, is a racist now and forever.
How do I know this? Because, although unless you knew me personally and over a long stretch of time, you cannot verify what I’m going to tell you, never in my life have I used, even in the privacy of my home when talking to myself, a racist word or phrase.
And even most of my friends and relatives who do know me well would not necessarily know that in my entire lifetime I have never even thought a racist word or phrase. It is therefore inconceivable to me that someone who makes a racist reference — even a cloaked, sly reference, as I’ve heard out of the mouths of some (ex) friends — just doesn’t understand what she’s done or said, or is genuinely sorry.
Paula Deen is sorry she was exposed. People who use racist words are racists and there’s no way their exposure and their profound public bath(os) has in any way cleansed their souls of the pollution that is ugly prejudice.
We will not cure Paula Deen the way she cures her hams, but we certainly do not have to buy anything she sells. What she sells is as tainted as is the West Virginia rivers and creeks polluted by dangerous drool from chemical plants.