Oprah plays the race card
Who do you believe? And do you care?:
Winfrey was in Switzerland in July when she walked into the Trois Pommes boutique in Zurich looking for a handbag…
She claims the sales assistant refused to show her the black crocodile leather bag because – seeing a black woman – she automatically assumed she would not be able to afford it.
Now the saleslady has hit back, stating: ‘I wasn’t sure what I should present to her when she came in on the afternoon of Saturday July 20 so I showed her some bags from the Jennifer Aniston collection.
‘I explained to her the bags came in different sizes and materials, like I always do.
‘She looked at a frame behind me. Far above there was the 35,000 Swiss franc crocodile leather bag.
‘I simply told her that it was like the one I held in my hand, only much more expensive, and that I could show her similar bags.
‘It is absolutely not true that I declined to show her the bag on racist grounds. I even asked her if she wanted to look at the bag.
So this is what the great civil rights movement of the 20th century has come down to in the 21st century and the Age of Obama.
And this is what handbags have come down to. “Jennifer Aniston collection”? 35,000 Swiss francs? Of course, as a capitalist, I defend Oprah’s right to buy whatever crazy bag she wants to, despite the price, if she’s gotten her money legally, which she has.
Here’s the bag in question. It’s the one on the right, according to the newspaper; sure doesn’t look like crocodile to me, but what do I know about crocodile?:
Another astounding factoid in the article, one I almost missed first time round, is that Tina Turner is getting married (Oprah was in Switzerland for Turner’s wedding). After the problems she’s supposedly had with Ike, I was surprised. She’s also marrying a German guy 16 years her junior (not that surprising, if you’re Tina Turner) with whom she’s been for 27 years. That’s longer than most Hollywood marriages, for goodness sake.
So you go, girl, glad to hear you’re tying the knot. But oh, that wedding dress! Let’s just say I hope it didn’t cost
35,000 Swiss francs, or even 1000 (and by the way, the Swiss franc is roughly equal to the American dollar):
Wait a second. “Junior” means younger, right? Turner is perpetually young.
THAT can’t be a wedding dress.
It’s too playful. It has to be a party dress.
The odds that Oprah was NOT recognized are nil.
She NEVER dresses poor. So the instant she walked in the door, she would’ve been radiating: “BIG money.”
Switzerland is the anti-Walmart of retailing.
Just shopping in a boutique there is a statement.
As for an out of reach handbag… that gal is no ‘shelf monkey.’ You can bet that just hauling out the ladder would be quite a production.
The magic words: “far above…”
The real story is that Oprah needs publicity for her “Butler.” She’s been working the hustle across the media canvas. Even Barbara Bush has been inducted into the crowing crew. (c.f. Drudge)
That is all.
I have seen pictures of Oprah, now this of Tina Turner and the saleslady in some pair of scary green pants and I think they are all a mess. I would only sell any of them a 35,000 dollar bag if they promised to wear it over their heads.
Sounds to me like Oprah is the racist who expects fawning and curtseying.
I have read too many reoports of her demeaning white emplyees.
Muslims and American blacks; those of the perpetually aggrieved persuasion.
Speak English, dang it. And if you misunderstand what I’m trying to tell you, I will ruin you. I guess that’s what they mean by “ugly American”.
We can’t know what happened. I think it entirely possible that the salesclerk did not recognize Oprah. She very well may have been wearing sunglasses to remain incognito.
Given Oprah’s celebrity and tendency to be hypersensitive to any slight, if the salesclerk did not recognize Oprah and thus didn’t overtly defer to her, I can easily envisage Oprah assuming her to be racist. The slightest hesitation by the clerk to get a ladder would then be seen as further ‘evidence’ of racism. So I suspect that could we have been a little bird observing the exchange we might find reasonable doubt that the clerk was racially biased.
The red bag is clearly crocodile. The unique ‘indentations’ of crocodile are I believe irremovable. Perhaps it is the paper that knows little of crocodiles?
I’m happy for Tina but the expression on the face of the fiancee is that of someone with indigestion.
Comment elsewhere on another blog: “Isn’t it funny how just as Oprah comes out in a new movie about race and Obama is presenting her with the Medal of Freedom she is suddenly discriminated against? “
Oh, boo hoo! A sales clerk wasn’t adequately obsequious to Oprah is a high end boutique.
Oprah has been one of the most powerful and successful media ipersonalities for decades. She could have easily asked for a manager or given her business to another boutique (goodness knows she has a few assistants who could be dispatched to do so). This is about as outrageous as Bill Gates having to wait a few minutes longer than expected for his wine at a fancy restaurant.
1. Oprah may be telling the truth.
2. Oprah may be misrepresenting or misinterpreting what happened in order to have something to talk about while promoting The Butler, the new movie in which she has a major role.
3. Now that I’ve mentioned The Butler, I highly recommend this movie.
4. There was a panel discussion afterward, with the writer, director and 5 of the principal actors, including Ms. Winfrey. She stayed for about a half hour after the panel discussion, and she was gracious to everyone wanting an autograph or a photograph with her.
The old Swiss bag seems to be demonstrating the practically perfect transmissive suppleness of a very thin leather. Why, however, we wouldn’t know.
Might it have entered Oprah’s noggin that the sales lady didn’t speak English as perfectly as she did? Naaaaah… got to be dat ol’ debbil racism.
I have no grudge against OW, but I suspect that she, like many blacks, has a huge chip on her shoulder.
I’ve got every reason on earth to be mad
Cause a salesclerk did not recognize who I am
And if I could get my way
I’d make them all bow down today
But I can’t so I cry racism instead.
I’ve got a chip on my shoulder
That’s bigger than my feet
I talk down to all the white people that I meet
And if I could see her now
I’d try to make her sad somehow
But I can’t so I cry racism instead.
After the problems she’s supposedly had with Ike, I was surprised.
Supposedly? Ike was a crack addict for goodness’ sake and died of a cocaine overdose.
Glad to see she’s happy in Switzerland: she deserves to be. (I really wonder what she thinks of the Oprah brouhaha now that she’s a Swiss citizen. I bet she’s embarrassed!)
Ira @ 7:13 . . .
Are you part of the PR team for this movie? That review was just a bit too canned.
Next time you should fake it better.
Geez, I have been asked to leave stores in some countries because people thought I was of any given ethnicity. And I have been discriminated against in some countries because of my actual nationality. And I have been over-charged for goods in some stores because of my nationality. And I have had confusing and unsatisfactory conversations with store clerks because we didn’t share a common language.
Stuff happens. I’m not sure I would recognize Oprah if I saw her on the streets. But does that make me racist? Or does that mean she wears too much makeup on stage?
No kidding, Anonymous. I’ve been treated differently when traveling in places where my WASPy American-ness stood out, such as Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey and Dubai . Was it my ethnicity, my gender, my English, or a hatred of my home country? Who knows and who cares. I remember the fun not the (real or perceived) slights.
Right. European salesclerks never give Americans attitude.
Never.
Oprah needs to chill out. “The customer is always right” is an adage here in North America. In the rest of the world, the “help” will override your wishes any time it suits them.
Either that, or this NEVER would have happened to a white woman.
Except that I got snobbery from European “help” all the time. It’s what they do.
Cheeze.
Oprah says in the video at that link to the Daily Mail article that she went all by herself to the store. My question is, really, without her bodyguards? Odd.
After her egregious comparison of Emmet Till’s murder with the thug Travon Martin, I have no problem believing the clerk.
Oprah’s been missing the spotlight, so she’s using the tool that works…just like Sharpton.
Oh, ho hum. Another day, another high profile person cries racism. Is there anyone in America, not named Obama, who has gained more from dark skin color than Oprah?
As others have said, you can experience worse treatment in large swaths of Europe just for speaking English.
For the record I will never, ever, attend a movie in which Jane Fonda appears. I do not care what the subject is, nor how favorable the reviews.
In the Muslim world there would be a Fatwah against her for traitorous acts. She is very fortunate that Americans, and particularly survivors of the Hanoi Hilton, are more tolerant; not forgiving, just tolerant.
No. Original review by me. I’ll trust you just as much.
Oprah is now a “has been.” She has no one to blame but herself since it was she who betrayed her own audience when she went pimping for Obama instead of her middle-class, white, female audience’s favorite – Hillary.
So, NOW, she is simply trying to drum up free publicity for her upcoming movie; and since she has not been in a movie in a long long time, she needs to do whatever to get people to go see her again.
I hope her movie and the rest of her career simply crashes and burns. The effing bigot!
oh, and since she feels that Trayvon is just like Emmet Till; then should I re-examine history and realize that Emmet Till was nothing but a street thug too? (Obama has already said that he was at Trayvon’s age – “I could have been Trayvon 30 years ago” – the only truthful statement to ever come out of his bigoted mouth)
Boycott her new movie.
That’s the Left’s favorite tactic.
“Boycott her new movie.”
I wasn’t going to see it anyway, does that count?
“Oh, boo hoo! A sales clerk wasn’t adequately obsequious to Oprah is a high end boutique” (Lizzy @7:13)
This might make you feel better. For over a decade I lived in a small town in Montana frequented, even then, by Hollywood types. The story that went around town was that a well know movie star was in town on vacation and had to get his SUV repaired. After taking it to the local dealer and being told to come back late that day the star responded with the inevitable “Do you know who I am?”
The response from the service manager was “Yeah, you’re fourth in line.”
Gotta luv ’em.
How ironic that race obsession has grown exponentially under our “post racial” president. The effect seems to have made his supporters so fixated on race that they relentlessly insert it into situations and conversations where it wouldn’t otherwise exist.
Neo:
Oprah plays the race card. And do you care?
Do I care that a billionaire did not receive the assistance from a sales clerk she believed she merited? No. She can vote with her credit card if she is so aggrieved.
Like others commenting here, sales clerks have not always treated me in the manner I believed I merited. Big deal. Overall, sales clerks have treated me with courtesy.
But then I care enough to write here. Oh well.
Oprah equals promise times white guilt squared, basically the same formula Obama used to capture the White House. No wonder the two square dance.
But here’s the thing about square dancing. It’s only moderately pleasing to viewers.
Oprah seeks to reconcile the competing claim.
She doesn’t like being in conflict with her white viewers. She doesn’t like being in conflict with Obama.
Answer: Discrimination. White guilt. The square factor. White guilt is kryptonite to the tea party, and by extension, all their friends and relatives.
I’ll give up just please never show either of those pictures again.
Racism as defined today has devolved into mere recognition and acknowledgement of chip on the shoulderism.
This is outrageous.
What will it take to knock that chip off her shoulder? Is being a world-famous BILLIONAIRE not enough praise and kisses for you, girlfriend?
And what about the ugly spectacle of one of the world’s Plutocrats crushing a shopgirl with an ugly lie? Trying to ruin the woman’s life just because she’s got a nitwit resentment — or just lying about it to try to make us serfs feel sorry for her?!
Wow. Just wow. The Mind Is Boggled.
(BTW, the photo isn’t of the shopgirl in question: it’s of the shop owner. The shopgirl gave a spirited defense of herself, which was great to see.)
Okrah really covered her own racism well all these years, didn’t she? All the time she was making nice, and very believably, too, with white guests on her show, she was going to Jeremiah Wright’s racist “church,” and eating it up.
This is exactly the same as if a hugely successful, admired by all races white man were revealed to be a card-carrying Klan member all these years.
I am so tired of all this. I voted for Dinkins years ago for NYC mayor, thinking that the blacks deserved a turn at the helm and maybe it would make them feel more included and less ticked off all the time. But he was so much in thrall to the ugly elements of the black community that his mayoralty cratered, and he didn’t get a second term, even in NY. Too bad, mon.
If not being shown a $35,000 handbag is the worst problem she faces, I’d say Oprah should, well, shut the fuck up. This isn’t “white people problems” or “first world problems” — this is “Madame Pompadour problems.”
This isnt the 1st time for Oprah, who likes to visit Europe despite how awful them white shop-keepers are:
http://oprahscrusade.blogspot.com/
True story:
I walk into Talbot’s Petites in downtown Princeton, NJ, to buy a blouse I saw in the window to gift my mom.
The saleswoman looks up at me. (I’m 5’9″ & was wearing platform sandals, probably close to 6′). She says “We don’t have anything for you here, all our merchandise is for women 5’3″ & under.”
So, since I don’t have a movie to push and the adoration of the media, I drove to Chico’s at the nearest mall and bought mom a blouse.
End of story.
“Is there anyone in America, not named Obama, who has gained more from dark skin color than Oprah?” Oldflyer
Just one. Barack Obama
It’s just more Negrophilia.
Bow and scrape, you Honkies. Weze (Ebonics) better than you.
Update:Oprah Winfrey says ‘sorry’ for Switzerland bag flap.
Oh well.
American celebrities may make the news in certain European media outlets, but that certainly doesn’t mean that everyone knows them. I would suspect that if anyone was judging Oprah it was on her clothes, which may not have had the appropriate European designers’ names. Zurich can be a very stuffy place.
sdferr, I saw what you did there.
Oprah can’t chill out because she has been taught all her life that the best defense against bad behavior is to attack the person she doesn’t like or fear.
When blacks were positioned as representatives of the South, whites attacked them as illiterate fools, bufoons, and puppets of Northern whites. The idea that blacks had their own reasons for behaving as they did (they weren’t allowed to be able to read or write) and that they could work well with white economic leaders for the benefit of all communities, wasn’t something people could swallow. It ran up against their culturally imposed limits.
The number one psychological reaction of these people is fear. Fear then contributes to anger, resentment, and a desire for vengeance.
The Democrat party tells their members that they have not only a right to attack people who discriminate against them, but that they deserve profit from it as well.
This is similar to telling a conquering army that because they fought and bled to conquer this village, so it is their just reward to pillage it and rape all the women. The results are predictable.
Greed is a powerful motivator in its own right. When combined with fear, one can get mighty interesting results out of humans.
Well, well, well, it turns out Oprah is a liar as well as greedy (being a billionaire isn’t enough) and a racist as well. As, knowingly accusing someone of being a racist, when you know its untrue, makes the accuser guilty of a racist lie.
As Gringo’s link above shows, the anonymous sales clerk has decided to dispute Winfrey’s story.
Oprah did it to increase her chances of getting a best actress Oscar and to promote her movie. The clerk didn’t recognize her (I once sat right next to Clint Eastwood! on a restaurant bar stool waiting for a table and never recognized him, my waiter pointed him out to me) so the clerk didn’t kowtow to her and she assumed racism.
As John Nolte of Breitbart.com points out;
“And what is Oprah’s reaction to being called a liar by a racist? Well, it certainly isn’t the reaction of someone who was the victim of racism and then called a liar by the racist.
No, when confronted with the shop girl’s charge, Oprah issued a non-apology apology saying she was “sorry” the incident “got blown up.”
Well, who ‘blew’ it up? While promoting the movie, Oprah also shared the anecdote with Larry King. Obviously, this anecdote is part of Oprah’s “Butler” promotional tour.
If we had a media worth a damn, it is right about now that they would be all over this.”
These are Oprah’s exact words,
“I say to the woman, ‘Excuse me, may I see that bag right above your head?’ And she says to me, ‘No, it’s too expensive.’ … She refused to get it.” “all told within the context of racism still being a very real problem for black people throughout the world.”
During the interview Oprah refused to identify the store. Why? She was afraid they got her on video tape and if she identified the store, they could prove Oprah’s a bald-faced liar.
Doesn’t bother or surprise me to find out Oprahs a bigot. But I have to say i’m about sick to my stomach of all the yucking it up white soccer moms who built this bigots empire and fortune.
That black purse costs as much as a Chevrolet Suburban?
The shop owner is, apparently, a pal of Tina.
She was invited to the wedding — and it’s a pretty good bet that Tina turned Oprah on to Tres Pommes in the first place.
That Swiss shop salesmenship (ESL) says a lot about American racial bias…
Well, that makes sense, doesn’t it?
I know it’s the first thing that came to my mind.
And people wonder why the world hates George W. Bush and Americans.
Well, we know part of the answer now.
scottthebadger,
That black purse costs as much as a Chevrolet Suburban?
I’d go for a Volvo S80, but, yes
.
Twenty years ago, a 20-something black woman worked for me in the engineering dept of a very large multinational corporation. She lived on the south side of Chicago and was into all things Black. She thought she was entitled to a separate set of rules and she had a cinder-block sized chip on her shoulder. She was quite smart and showed flashes of engineering brilliance at times. But she had an “attitude” that stood in her way. Her poor performance reviews and lack of upward mobility had nothing to do with her race, per se, but rather it was her own attitude about her race that blocked her progress.
I have seen multiple examples of this same thing in the intervening 20 years. Sometimes people see racism where it doesn’t exist and then use that perceived racism as an excuse for their own shortcomings.
One of the reasons why slaves often rebel and then destroy themselves or become a new master race, is because they have no model other than their slave lords on how to run a proper system. Thus instead of freeing themselves and their fellow slaves, instead they are motivated to “get out of slavery” by owning slaves themselves. When they become the Lord, they will be free of the whip and the lash.
People who are mentally stuck on discrimination and racism, may not have physical chains but know this. The spiritual chains that bind their minds to being a slave, has never been erased.
One just has to follow the chain itself to see who is the puppet master here.
Oprah is just another successful black person, like Colin Powell, that has decided to circle the racial wagons. It is pathetic and she should be ashamed. But, progressives like her, are never ashamed of anything they do. They live by “the end justifies the means.” Oprah was upset that about the thug Travyon Martin outcome and now he’s having a racial tantrum. Poor baby.
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