Oprah Winfrey apologizes for naming Switzerland in store racism incident: I’m sorry ‘it got blown up’
Speaking to reporters at the premiere of ‘The Butler,’ (
at the irony) Winfrey said she didn’t intend to cause a media frenzy for the country.
By Chiderah Monde / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Splash News/Splash News
Winfrey insists an apology from Switzerland was not necessary, saying it was an isolated incident. ‘I'm sorry that I said it was Switzerland.’
Though
Oprah Winfrey was the one who felt slighted by a sales woman while shopping in Switzerland, the media mogul is apologizing after what she called an incident of racial profiling - saying she's "sorry" that a frenzy emerged for the country, and the store.
"I think that incident in Switzerland was just an incident in Switzerland,” Winfrey, 59, told reporters on Monday night. “I'm really sorry that it got blown up. I purposefully did not mention the name of the store. I'm sorry that I said it was Switzerland."
The Queen of Talk made the apologetic comments about her encounter during the Los Angeles premiere of "Lee Daniels' The Butler,” according to the Associated Press.
Entertainment Tonight
The 59-year-old media maven first talked to 'Entertainment Tonight' about the racism she experienced at a Zurich handbag store.
"I was just referencing it as an example of being in a place where people don't expect that you would be able to be there," she continued.
In recent interview with "Entertainment Tonight," Winfrey recalled that a clerk at an upscale Zurich boutique refused to show her a handbag. Winfrey said she was told she could not afford the $38,000 purse.
RELATED: OPRAH WINFREY'S BRUSH WITH RACISM SPARKS INTERNATIONAL INCIDENT
STEFFEN SCHMIDT/EPA
The exclusive Trois Pommes boutique was outed as the luxury store in which a worker refused to show an expensive handbag to Winfrey.
"I'm in a store, and the person doesn't obviously know that I carry the black card, and so they make an assessment based upon the way I look and who I am," said Winfrey, who earned $77 million in the year ending in June, according to Forbes magazine.
"I didn't have anything that said `I have money.' I wasn't wearing a diamond stud. I didn't have a pocketbook. I didn't wear Louboutin shoes. I didn't have anything," said Winfrey on the red carpet. "You should be able to go in a store looking like whatever you look like and say, `I'd like to see this.' That didn't happen."
But the woman who supposedly helped Winfrey that day had
a different story to tell.
Blick / Splash News/Blick / Splash News
Winfrey said she walked into the store was interested in purchasing a black crocodile skin Tom Ford handbag that was kept behind a screen, but the sales woman told her she could not afford that one and instead showed her a version costing around a tenth of the price. Winfrey said it showed she still has to deal with racism.
“I would never say something like that to a customer,” the unidentified clerk said to a Swiss newspaper.
“I don't know why she is making these accusations. She is so powerful, and I am just a shop girl,” the woman said.
RELATED: OPRAH'S ACCOUNT OF RACISM IN SWITZERLAND 'NOT TRUE': SHOP CLERK
Mike Windle/Getty Images for TWC
The Zurich boutique clerk accused of racially profiling Winfrey fired back, claiming in an anonymous interview with a local newspaper that the Queen of Talk’s account was ‘not true’ and was ‘absurd.’
“It is absolutely not true that I declined to show her the bag on racist grounds.”
The woman added that she would apologize and “say it was all a misunderstanding” if given the chance to speak again to Winfrey, whom she did not recognize that day.
Swiss tourism officials and the boutique owner did their own share of apologizing for the incident last week, but Winfrey insists there's no need.
Thomas Luethi/FAMEFLYNET PICTURE/Thomas Luethi/FAMEFLYNET PICTURE
The owner of the boutique, Trudie Goetz, publicly defended her employee, telling Reuters, ‘This is an absolute classic misunderstanding.’
"It's not an indictment against the country or even that store," she continued. "It was just one person who didn't want to offer me the opportunity to see the bag. So no apologies necessary from the country of Switzerland. If somebody makes a mistake in the United States, do we apologize in front of the whole country? No!"
-- With Ethan Sacks and News Wire Services
Read more:
http://www.nydailynews.com/entertai...ncident-blown-article-1.1425378#ixzz2c4IPJd4S
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