A television news anchorwoman in the US apologized on-air after comparing her black colleague to a gorilla, NBC News reported Tuesday.
Alex Housden of KOCO 5 News in Oklahoma City made the remark last Thursday during a segment on an ape whose handler was running the local zoo’s Instagram for the day.
When a video of a baby gorilla appeared on screen, Housden, who is white, turned to her black co-anchor, Jason Hackett, and said that the ape “kind of looks like you,” NBC reported.
The following day, a tearful Housden apologized to Hackett, saying: “I said something yesterday that was inconsiderate, it was inappropriate, and I hurt people.”
“I want you all to know from the bottom of my heart, I apologize for what I said. I know it was wrong and I am so sorry.”
Hackett accepted her apology, but acknowledged that the words “cut deep for me.”
“I want this to be a teachable moment and that lesson here is that words, words matter,” he said. “There’s no doubt about that.”
The incident comes amid heightened racial tensions in the US following a series of remarks by Republican President Donald Trump directed at lawmakers from the Democratic opposition that have been criticized as racist.
{{/usCountry}}The incident comes amid heightened racial tensions in the US following a series of remarks by Republican President Donald Trump directed at lawmakers from the Democratic opposition that have been criticized as racist.
{{/usCountry}}The president in July said four Democratic lawmakers of color should “go back” to where they came from, then later called Baltimore, a majority-black city, a “dangerous & filthy place.”
(The story has been published from a wire feed without any modifications to the text, only the headline has been changed.)