Big Brother contestant GinaMarie Zimmerman has been sacked from her day job after her use of racial slurs on the reality show. The contestant used the N-word on the reality series, and referred to welfare as "n***er insurance."
Zimmerman, who worked as pageant coordinator for East Coast USA Pageant, Inc., for five years, has been dropped company after displaying "acts of racism."
National Director and CEO of East Coast USA Pageant Laurent Handler said in a statement: "The East Coast USA Pageant is an outlet for girls and women to gain self-confidence announce their platform and most importantly celebrate who they are. We believe and teach our contestants that beauty comes from within. We celebrate the diversity of our participants as all ethnicities are beautiful. We have never known this side of Ginamarie or have ever witnessed such acts of racism in the past.
"We are actually thankful that this show let us see Ginamarie for who she truly is as we would never want her to be a role model to our future contestants. It is unfortunate that her hateful words were able to be witnessed by so many thousands of Big Brother fans as they were rightfully so deeply offended. We are unable to contact her at this time but when she returns from the Big Brother house we will be terminating her employment for her unforgivable behavior. In a business where we are surrounded by beauty every day we are saddened to see something so ugly come from someone we put on a very high pedestal."
Zimmerman is not the first one wrapped up in controversy for her racial comments. Another contestant, Aaryn Gries, was fired from her modeling agency after she made offensive remarks to her fellow housemates. She told an Asian-American contestant, Helen Kim, to "shut up and go make some rice," and referred to an African-American contestant, saying "be careful what you say in the dark, you might not be able to see that b****."
In light of the controversy that the houseguests have sparked, CBS released a statement, telling TVGuide.com:
"Big Brother is a reality show about watching a group of people who have no privacy 24/7 — and seeing every moment of their lives. At times, the Houseguests reveal prejudices and other beliefs that we do not condone. We certainly find the statements made by several of the Houseguests on the live Internet feed to be offensive. Any views or opinions expressed in personal commentary by a Houseguest appearing on Big Brother, either on any live feed from the House or during the broadcast, are those of the individual(s) speaking and do not represent the views or opinions of CBS or the producers of the program."
