UPDATE:
IAC said in a statement Saturday: “The offensive comment does not reflect the views and values of IAC. We take this issue very seriously, and we have parted ways with the employee in question.”
“There is no excuse for the hateful statements that have been made and we condemn them unequivocally,” the statement went on. “We hope, however, that time and action, and the forgiving human spirit, will not result in the wholesale condemnation of an individual who we have otherwise known to be a decent person at core.”
Previous:
A PR executive who Tweeted a racist ‘joke’ on Friday that sparked international outrage was unaware she had become front page news because she posted the message while boarding a long-haul flight.
Justine Sacco – the Communications Director for IAC, a parent company for Vimeo, OkCupid, Tinder, CollegeHumor, and Dictionary.com – was flying to Cape Town when she Tweeted: ‘Going to Africa. Hope I don’t get AIDS. Just Kidding. I’m White!’
The post had been retweeted over 3000 times and was picked up by news sites around the world by the time Sacco landed in Africa.
Blasted for being ‘outrageous’ and ‘inappropriate’, with titles like ‘Worst Tweet of the Year’ stacking up, Sacco promptly deleted the Tweet, with her entire Twitter account soon vanishing as well.
But the damage had been done, and IAC were forced to comment on Sacco’s behalf.
‘This is an outrageous, offensive comment that does not reflect the views and values of IAC. Unfortunately, the employee in question is unreachable on an international flight, but this is a very serious matter and we are taking appropriate action,’ a representative from IAC told the International Business Times.
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2527330/Blonde-female-PR-executive-tweets-Going-Africa-Hope-I-dont-AIDS-Just-kidding-Im-white-causes-international-outrage-likely-fired.html#ixzz2o7ssjy3g
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