{"id":46168,"date":"2025-09-09T17:00:41","date_gmt":"2025-09-09T17:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/musicianvoice.com\/index.php\/2025\/09\/09\/paula-deen-says-she-was-forced-to-apologize-for-racial-slur\/"},"modified":"2025-09-09T17:00:41","modified_gmt":"2025-09-09T17:00:41","slug":"paula-deen-says-she-was-forced-to-apologize-for-racial-slur","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/musicianvoice.com\/index.php\/2025\/09\/09\/paula-deen-says-she-was-forced-to-apologize-for-racial-slur\/","title":{"rendered":"Paula Deen Says She Was Forced to Apologize for Racial Slur"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p>Paula Deen recounts two men forcing her to apologize after she admitted to using racial slurs in 2013. \u201cWhat am I apologizing for?\u201d the author and television personality recalls saying.<\/p>\n<p>During an interview with the <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hollywoodreporter.com\/movies\/movie-features\/paula-deen-new-movie-release-no-apology-n-word-1236364302\/\" target=\"_blank\">Hollywood Reporter<\/a> <\/em>in support of a new documentary called <em>Canceled: The Paula Deen Story<\/em>, the 78-year-old celebrity cook works to get her full story into the public discourse.<\/p>\n<p>Instead, Deen says, only the story of the woman who sued her is remembered.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey took this woman [the plaintiff], who is a known liar, they took her word and ran with it, and no one ever investigated any further,\u201d Deen says. \u201cI was not going to be happy until the world saw the truth.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>Related<\/strong><\/em>: <a href=\"https:\/\/tasteofcountry.com\/what-happened-to-paula-deen\/\">What\u00a0Did Paula Deen Say? Southern Cook&#8217;s Secret History<\/a><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>In 2013, Deen and her brother Bubba Hiers were sued by a former employee named Lisa Jackson on charges of racial discrimination and sexual harassment.<\/li>\n<li>The racial discrimination charge was tossed by a judge, but during a deposition, Deen admitted to using the N-word as recently as the 1980s.<\/li>\n<li>The controversy led to multiple sponsors dropping her and several of her television shows being paused or canceled.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Deen and sons Jamie and Bobby were interviewed by THR, and it\u2019s clear from the start they disagree on several key points, including whether or not the documentary should have been filmed and released to begin with. It\u2019s as much a Q&amp;A as it is a familiar squabble between a mother and her two sons.<\/p>\n<p>Her main reason for agreeing to let Billy Corben make this film was to clear her conscience and get her story out there.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI kind of want my soul back,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n<p>It would appear the film helped her with that, as a\u00a0<em>Canceled: The Paula Deen Story<\/em>\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.hollywoodreporter.com\/movies\/movie-reviews\/canceled-the-paula-deen-story-review-1236362988\/\" target=\"_blank\">review<\/a> in the<em> Hollywood Reporter<\/em> criticized the project as being too sympathetic and offering more excuses than accountability.<\/p>\n<p>During this interview, a question about <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2013\/06\/21\/showbiz\/paula-deen-racial-slur\/index.html\" target=\"_blank\">her 2013 video apology<\/a> gets interrupted.<\/p>\n<div class=\"single-post-image \">\n<figure class=\"img-tag has-sizer alignnone\">\n<p><span class=\"visually-hidden\">Paula Deen with her sons Bobby and Jamie and filmmaker Billy Corben<\/span><\/p><figcaption>Gareth Cattermole, Getty Images for IMDb<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<p>\u201cThey made me,\u201d Deen says. \u201cThey brought me to N.Y. The two men I couldn\u2019t tell you who they were \u2014\u201c<\/p>\n<p>At that point, her son Jamie interrupts to say she was not forced to apologize, after which Deen sets the scene of her with two men in a big New York City skyscraper.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;They took me upstairs and introduced me to these two men and they said, &#8216;You need to put out an apology.&#8217; And I said, &#8216;What am I apologizing for? What am I supposed to be sorry about? I told the truth [at the deposition].'&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><strong>How To Watch the Paula Deen Documentary<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><em>Canceled: The Paula Deen Story <\/em>debuted at the Toronto Film Festival last weekend. There is no trailer for the movie, and so far, it&#8217;s not been announced as picked up by a distributor.<\/p>\n<p>Today, Deen says she understands why using the N-word is bad and says it makes her shiver to hear it. When asks if she\u2019d do anything different, she quips that she\u2019d choose a different lawyer, one with a tongue.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey asked me a question &#8230; This group of attorneys from an established well-thought-of firm. They were horrible; they were horrible. The lawyer\u00a0sitting there with me never opened his mouth. Not one time,\u201d Deen recalls.<\/p>\n<div class=\"photogallery-wrapper blog-photogallery \">\n<h2 class=\"photogallery-title\">R.I.P.: 40 Country Singers and Songwriters Who Died Too Soon<\/h2>\n<div class=\"photogallery-description\">\n<p>These country singers had so much more to give. See 40 country singers who died much too soon: Keith Whitley, Mindy McCready, Troy Gentry and more.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p class=\"photogallery-credit\">Gallery Credit: Billy Dukes<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"photogallery-wrapper blog-photogallery \">\n<h2 class=\"photogallery-title\">See the Most Played Country Song from the Year You Were Born<\/h2>\n<div class=\"photogallery-description\">\n<p>Who had the most played country song during the year you were born? This list is a fascinating time capsule of prevalent trends from every decade in American history. Scroll through to find your birth year and then click to listen. Some of these songs have been lost through the years, many of them for good reason!<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p class=\"photogallery-credit\">Gallery Credit: <a href=\"https:\/\/tasteofcountry.com\/author\/billydukes\/\" target=\"_blank\">Billy Dukes<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><script src=\"https:\/\/tasteofcountry.com\/rest\/carbon\/api\/scripts.js?mver=70&#038;gver=6&#038;bid=204&#038;urls[]=https%3A%2F%2Fbtloader.com%2Ftag%3Fo%3D5642230212591616%26upapi%3Dtrue&#038;urls[]=https%3A%2F%2Fcdn.p-n.io%2Fpushly-sdk.min.js%3Fdomain_key%3DGbJ4PR9JZzdxdLXzJnfIG9ZgkXSFQNevIcIY&#038;urls[]=https%3A%2F%2Ftownsquare.media%2Fpublic%2Fresources%2Fjs%2Fpubcid.min.js&#038;urls[]=https%3A%2F%2Fplatform.twitter.com%2Fwidgets.js&#038;urls[]=https%3A%2F%2Fapis.google.com%2Fjs%2Fplatform.js&#038;urls[]=https%3A%2F%2Fconnect.facebook.net%2Fen_US%2Fsdk.js&#038;urls[]=https%3A%2F%2Fassets.pinterest.com%2Fjs%2Fpinit.js\" type=\"text\/javascript\" async defer data-osano=\"ESSENTIAL\"><\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/tasteofcountry.com\/paula-deen-interview-forced-to-apologize\/\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Paula Deen recounts two men forcing her to apologize after she admitted to using racial slurs in 2013. \u201cWhat am I apologizing for?\u201d the&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":46169,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46168","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-country","article","has-excerpt","has-avatar","has-author","has-date","has-comment-count","has-category-meta","has-read-more","thumbnail-"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/musicianvoice.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46168","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/musicianvoice.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/musicianvoice.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musicianvoice.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musicianvoice.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46168"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/musicianvoice.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46168\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musicianvoice.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/musicianvoice.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musicianvoice.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/musicianvoice.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}