Is it something in the water? This week, more so than usual, there seems to be an overabundance of celebrities who are opening practicing the old “mouth and inserting foot” technique. After Hulk Hogan and family spoke ill of the young man gravely injured in a car wreck in which their son was driving, now Sharon Stone has said maybe the Chinese are just getting what was coming to them.
What?
Did Sharon Stone actually insinuate that the horrendous earthquake China just had and all the suffering the people are going through was a result of “bad karma” for its treatment of Tibet? Yes, yes she did.
Last week, Sharon gave an interview on the red carpet at the Cannes Film Festival in which she said, “I’m not happy about the way the Chinese are treating the Tibetans because I don’t think anyone should be unkind to anyone else. And then this earthquake and all this stuff happened, and then I thought, is that karma? When you’re not nice that the bad things happen to you?”
Of course, I am picturing her PR people doing damage control almost as soon as they heard those words come out of her mouth! Christian Dior announced today that it has dropped her from its Chinese advertisements and now Sharon has released an apology. She said she was “deeply sorry” for her remarks. She went on to say, “Due to my inappropriate words and acts during the interview, I feel deeply sorry and sad about hurting Chinese people. I am willing to take part in the relief work of China’s earthquake, and wholly devote myself to helping affected Chinese people.”
Sharon went on to say she has worked with international charities for 20 years and she wants to help the Chinese people. Last year, she attended the Shanghai Movie Festival and said she felt “deeply the Chinese people’s wisdom and hospitality.”
I will admit the Chinese government has mistreated the Tibetans. But, to say that maybe this was karma is terrible. Last I read, there were at least 60,000 dead and countless others homeless. In case Sharon didn’t get the memo, China is a communist/socialist state – I doubt many of the Chinese people who are suffering had anything to do with the Tibet situation. These people were just trying to live their day-to-day lives as we do. The United States has suffered one of the worst years for tornado deaths –is this part of our bad karma?
Come on – we all know the Chinese government has done some bad things (and that is probably an understatement). And, yes I do believe when you do bad, bad comes right back at you. But, I believe it more on a one-on-one basis, not lumping an entire country into the mix.
I hope the harebrained comments by celebrities this week will cause others to think before they speak!