A year after admitting to her use of the n-word, the celebrity chef Paula Deen tweeted a #TransformationTuesday photo on Twitter featuring herself and her son—the latter posing in brownface.
In the photograph, which is actually from four years ago but was posted on Tuesday morning, Deen is dressed as Lucille Ball’s character from “I Love Lucy. Her son Bobby Deen’s skin is visibly darkened brown by makeup and he is dressed as Lucy’s Cuban husband, Ricky Ricardo.
Following the immediate negative feedback she got on Twitter and Facebook, Deen has removed the photo from her social media pages. Quartz has reached out to Deen’s public relations staff, and will update this post with any response.
Social media users were quick to respond, with some pointing out that it wasn’t necessary for Bobby to darken his face in order to portray a Cuban man, and others highlighting the historical connotations of brown and black face. Others compared Deen with the real estate developer and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, who is facing his own backlash over racially insensitive comments.
Check out some of the tweets:
After deleting the tweet that brought such wide attention to her twitter feed, Deen did not provide any explanation.
She did, however, tweet about her upcoming cookbook: