NEW YORK, Oct. 12 (UPI) — Raven-Symoné has addressed her controversial comments on The View regarding name discrimination after facing heavy backlash.
The former Disney channel star took to Facebook Sunday evening to clarify her stance and to admit that her “comments about discrimination have spun out of control.”
“I’d like to begin by saying that I was not attacking a specific race, but repeating a name that was said in a viral video which has received over 2 million likes,” she wrote to her 4.8 million followers. “My comment was in poor taste. My lack of empathy towards name discrimination was uncalled for….As an equal opportunity employer, I have never discriminated against a name….even though I said I would, it’s not true.”
On Thursday, Raven-Symoné came under fire after explaining that she would never hire someone named “Watermelondrea” during a discussion on The View about the judgement of people based on their names.
“Just to bring it back, can we take back ‘racist’ and say ‘discriminatory,’ because I think that’s a better word,” she said during the daytime talk-show. “And I am very discriminatory against words like the ones that they were saying in the video. I’m not about to hire you if your name is Watermelondrea. It’s just not going to happen. I’m not going to hire you.”
Now however, the 29-year-old has opened up about her own experiences regarding discrimination and how she relates to those who were affected by her comments.
“I have been denied many jobs because of my skin color, body size, and age. Each time I was rejected, my self-esteem was negatively affected, so I empathize with those who feel victimized by what I said,” she wrote. “We would hope that when it comes to hiring, our names, physical appearance, sexual orientation, and age would never outweigh our qualifications, but often times, they do, that’s the truth and it sucks. But I should not be part of the problem, I should be part of the solution.”
Fellow co-hosts Joy Behar and Michelle Collins also sparked up controversy in September after mocking Miss America contestant Kelly Johnson for making a speech in her nurse uniform during the pageant’s talent portion.
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