There's never a good time for a beauty site to publicly mix up two of Hollywood's top black celebrities, but last night's Oscars was an especially poor moment.
Amid an evening largely defined by frequent racial-inequality discussion, both on stage and online, a site called Total Beauty tweeted an image of Whoopi Goldberg with the caption, "We had no idea Oprah was tatted, and we love it."
"@KennyCoble: This tweet is going to live forever, @TotalBeauty. #OscarsSoWhitepic.twitter.com/y2eSdii6w1" wow
— Kiki Fox (@iamlegend924) February 29, 2016
Promptly mocked and parodied for the flub, the site deleted its tweet (along with a later post that confused Good Morning America's Lara Spencer for Brazilian singer Claudia Leitte) and posted an apology:
We'd like to apologize to Oprah and Whoopi, as well as everyone we've offended. It was our error, and there are no excuses. We're sorry.
— Total Beauty (@TotalBeauty) February 29, 2016
The mistake was so baffling and instantly viral, many wondered if the beauty site was intentionally trolling those following the Oscars and its related race debates.
It's not like confusing two unknown. These are two of the most famous women in the entire world. @TotalBeauty might be trolling...
— Brian Koppelman (@briankoppelman) February 29, 2016
@darraghdoyle 12.9k tweets, the site is legit @TotalBeauty probably isn't trolling but may regret their Twitter moderator choice.
— MarkGDub (@MarkGDub) February 29, 2016
Early this morning, Total Beauty used the #ThatsNotOprah hashtag created by its critics to announce it would donate $10,000 to a charity favored by the two stars (though it's unclear if they mean $5,000 for each or that Oprah and Whoopi must agree on one charity).
Using this #Oscars#SNAFU as an opportunity to donate $10k to @whoopigoldberg& @oprah's charity of choice. #ThatsNotOprah#WeMeanIt
— Total Beauty (@TotalBeauty) February 29, 2016
Oprah's response to the original mixup tweet was captured in the form of an Instagram reaction pic by her closest friend, Gayle King:
