Paula Deen Tried To Cook A ‘Sambo Burger’

[HipChick]

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http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2013/06/paula-deen-sambo-burger.php


In her 2006 memoir “It Ain’t All About The Cookin’,” while describing her early experiences with race, Deen wrote at length about growing up in the segregated South. Among her recollections was an incident from her youth where she hit a black girl “with a bolo bat” and the girl’s mother wound up in jail. She also wrote about a time later in her life when she attempted to make a “Sambo burger” on her TV show and had to be dissuaded by producers.

Update: June 21, 2013, 6:36 PM

In the book, Deen, who was born in 1947, frankly wrote about her youth in Albany, Ga., where she “never thought” about the fact she was living “in the mix of what was fixin’ to be a huge social change.”

In one passage, she detailed a particularly troubling experience she had at the age of 10 with a “real nice black woman” who “often babysat” her and that woman’s child:

“This one day she had brought her little girl to work, and that child had many big, fat blisters on her hand, probably from helping out her momma. Something about those blisters just attracted me and I remember hitting those little hands with a bolo bat, and it busted her blisters good. It was pretty satisfying.

I don’t know why I did it. I have a hard time thinking I did it out of meanness. But her mother—I can’t remember if she slapped me across the face or she spanked me or both—but either way, now I know I sure had it comin’.

Well, still I was heartbroken and I went running to find my Grandmother Paul and Granddaddy and my momma. And my granddaddy had the woman arrested for hitting me. The little black girl’s momma went to jail.

All this time it’s bothered me.

It was me who deserved to be sittin’ in that jail for breaking a little black girl’s blisters in 1957.”


Along with these incidents from her youth, Deen also wrote with a surprising lack of self-awareness about a situation that occurred after she began her television career when she wanted to make a recipe she called the “Sambo Burger” on her show:
.”
FULL STORY AT LINK

[IDemo]

1. I was just joking, Paula

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=3054369

[Control-Z]

2. I hheard on the radio

(So I can't link to it) that in January, this year, she called Al Roker "Chocolate Face".

[malaise]

3. A very sick racist woman

[HipChick]

5. I heard she was at a hotel in the Carribean a few years back..

Trying to get some juicy details...

[malaise]

12. This should be good

[uponit7771]

4. WHOA!!! WTF is wrong with her!?!?

[Ian David]

6. I wouldn't hold her responsible for what she did when she was 10. There's enough bad stuff...

... that she's said and done as an adult.

Edited to add, for those who don't know:

Sambo is a term for a person with African heritage and, in some countries, also mixed with Native American heritage (see zambo).

...

Examples of "Sambo" as a common name can be found as far back as the 18th century. In Thackeray's novel Vanity Fair (serialised from 1847), the black skinned Indian servant of the Sedley family from Chapter One, is called Sambo. Similarly, in Harriet Beecher Stowe's controversial novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852), one of Simon Legree's overseers is named Sambo. Instances of it being used as a stereotypical name for African Americans can be found as early as the Civil War. The name does not seem to have acquired the intentional, open racist connotation until the first half of the 20th century — possibly in defiance of protests made by African Americans.[citation needed]

More:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sambo_%28racial_term%29

[xmas74]

9. I thought maybe it was a reference to the old restaurant chain.

The burger, that is.

I already knew what the term really meant.

[HipChick]

10. Here..try this for definition..

for all y'all acting like you don't know..

Sambo' is now used as a racial slur equivalent to a pickaninny which is essentially a shiftless, lazy black person

[CakeGrrl]

16. My problem with what she did at 10

was that both a child and her mother suffered due to her sadistic act and her ability to use white privilege.

I guess whatever semblance of conscience she has compelled her to admit it.

[BlueToTheBone]

22. Even as a 10 year old, she had no compassion

and believed she had the right to do as she wished to anyone and anything. Her narcissism is deep and her family showed her the way.

[jaysunb]

7. I'm having a hard time getting angry at this lady.

She is a product of her times....as I am also.
I was on the recieving end this thought and behavior both de jure and de facto. As child in Mississippi or a youngster growing up in Ohio, I heard it directly no matter the lipstick placed on it.
Black folks laugh at this kind of "outrage."

She could have saved herself a lot of trouble by simply saying, " I don't recall," in her depostion. But,bless her heart, she didn't lie...she owned it.

Too bad...I hope she gets another shot at it.

[Sheldon Cooper]

13. How nice that black folks "laugh at this kind of outrage".

I'm glad that white folks like me aren't laughing at it now.

[jaysunb]

14. Me too

but I think you get my point.

[Rowdyboy]

18. Like you, my black friends here in Mississippi would laugh off this "outrage"

What our governor and legislature are trying to do to Medicaid and Voting Rights and Food Stamps-that's the real outrage. Not what some rich old white woman said awhile back.

[Ecumenist]

26. JaysunB, I've been black ALL MY LIFE and I find NOTHING funny about what she's

said or did. NOTHING!

[Apophis]

28. I'm a black man and I don't find Paula Deen hilarious.

[ProudToBeBlueInRhody]

8. I believe the story, but I'm betting her ghost writer/editor told her to add the last part (n/m)

[csziggy]

11. My first thought was she was making burgers like used to be at Sambo Restaurants

There used to be a chain of restaurants called Sambo's. They served a pretty good hamburger, according to what I've heard, though if I ever ate at one I was too young to remember it.

There is still a Sambo's in Santa Barbara, California and they have a "Smabo's burger" on their menu: http://www.sambosrestaurant.com/m2.html

From their front page:

Sam is Sam Battistone and Bo is Newell Bohnett, known affectionately to his friends, family and associates as "Bo". Despite all the other stories you may have heard - this is really how SAMBO'S got its name. 'The Story of Little Black Sambo' by Helen Bannerman was an afterthought. The SAMBO'S RESTAURANT already was established before the children's story was discovered and used as part of a marketing promotion.
<SNIP>
From 1957 until around 1978, Sambo's was a growing part of the American landscape. For a number of reasons Sambo's began to slow down and its transition from an innovative coffee cafe in Santa Barbara to a multi-million dollar corporation began to take its toll - In August 1981 there were 1,117 restaurants in 47 states.

Some restaurants in the Northeastern part of the U.S. tried a new name - ' No Place Like Sam's ' in an attempt to reverse a four-year tailspin. Sadly, in 1982 all but the original Sambo's in Santa Barbara closed their doors.
http://www.sambosrestaurant.com/

[xmas74]

15. I posted the same thing.

I only vaguely remember them but supposedly they had pretty good food.

[pinboy3niner]

17. There was one near my HS in the '60s

It was in Sepulveda, CA, on Nordhoff St. just West of Sepulveda Bl. (in the San Fernando Valley).

It was the closest restaurant to the school, so I remember going there a few times. The burgers there were good, but usually we could only afford coffee.

I don't remember it lasting long. That location kept turning over to different restaurants and chains.

[jmowreader]

24. Sambo's was like IHOP or Denny's

My mom really liked Sambo's restaurants; when we went anywhere that had one, that's where we ate.

If you like the food in those two chains, you'd have liked Sambo's. So who knows, the Sambo Burger might have been good.

Watch Vin Diesel's "XXX." The "diner test" scene was shot in a restaurant that looked very much like a Sambo's, just without the big pictures from "Little Black Sambo."

[Blue_Roses]

25. that's what I thought....

I remember Sambo's Resturant...great burgers!

[Apophis]

29. That's the first thing I thought of as well.

[Raine]

19. She's even worse than I thought! nt

[HipChick]

20. I can't believe DU'ers are giving her a pass

[lib87]

21. I Can

Still disappointing as hell.

[Ecumenist]

27. Me either, Hipchick. I DON'T GET IT AT ALL.

[MineralMan]

23. Paula Deen is a moron.

Television is chock-a-block with morons.