A contestant on Season 21 of “Big Brother” has come under fire after making a racially-charged joke about an Asian housemate this week.
The moment, which was captured on the program’s live feed, occurred during a conversation between five White houseguests: Tommy Bracco, Kathryn Dunn, Christie Murphy, Analyse Talavera and the one in question, Jack Matthews.
The houseguests — most being members of the so-called “Gr8ful” alliance — were discussing about the only Asian guest in the house, Isabella Wang, who was furious after her supposed alliance voted to evict Cliff Hogg instead of Nicole Anthony.
In calling them out, Wang used the phrase “the proof is in the pudding,” which became the basis of Matthews’ questionable joke.
In a clip first exposed by TMZ, Bracco is heard repeating the same phrase, with Matthews jumping in to specify, “the rice pudding.”
None of the other houseguests appear to have recognized the racist undertone in Matthews’ joke, while Bracco goes on to lead the conversation.
Interestingly, Matthews and Bracco discussed the joke later, hinting intervention from the CBS show’s producers.
Without further explanation, Matthews claimed that his joke was “misconstrued,” while Bracco argued that he only wanted to return to the actual conversation.
Matthews immediately sparked outrage on Twitter, with some even signing a petition to get him out of the house.
This is not the first time, however, that Matthews has been slammed with accusations of racism.
From the beginning of the show, he made controversial comments toward its only Black female houseguest, Kemi Faknule, saying that he wanted to “stomp a mud hole through her chest,” according to popculture.com.
He also caught ire after mimicking a monkey in reference to David Alexander, the only Black male houseguest of the season.
Images via Instagram / @cbs_bigbrother
