I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here! star Nella Rose has been defended by TV star London Hughes after being slammed for her explosive row with Fred Sirieix.
Some ITV viewers have criticised the way the YouTuber handled the argument with the First Dates star on social media, which imploded when he said he felt like her dad.
Nella was upset by the remark, made by the Road Trip presenter in reference to their respective ages- he is 51 and she is 26, because she lost both parents at a young age.
Fred did not realise the faux pas until the next morning, when Nella began repeatedly ignoring him, and then apologised when she explained she felt ‘disrespected’ and her ‘feelings were hurt.’
Nella begrudgingly accepted the maître d’s sorry but told him: ‘I don’t want to eat no food that you’re cooking, don’t talk to me, you stay over there, I stay over here and we can live.’
Taking aim at the X, formerly known as Twitter, users who have cruelly called for Nella to be ‘cancelled’ over the debacle, London pointed out the bashing has been loaded with ‘racial prejudice.’
The comedian, 34, wrote: ‘Whether you choose to believe it isn’t my problem. But there’s real hatred in these tweets aimed at Nella! It’s dripping with racial prejudice.
‘Words like”sub-human” and “disgusting animal” to describe a black girl you disagree with on a family entertainment show? Really?’
Echoing London’s sentiment, Metro.co.uk‘s Alicia Adejobi previously explained the argument was ‘uncomfortable’ because she was aware that ‘as a Black woman on reality TV, the public reaction would paint Nella as the villain but to the extreme (which has happened).’
She wrote: ‘The whole thing was uncomfortable to watch in every sense; that Fred didn’t understand what he did wrong, the fact he didn’t really do anything wrong, that Nella overreacted to the situation but also that she thought he would intentionally be insensitive about the death of her parents.
‘It was also uncomfortable for me because I knew that, as a Black woman on reality TV, the public reaction would paint Nella as the villain but to the extreme (which has happened). ‘
London is not the only celebrity to have defended Nella’s reaction to Fred, with Loose Women’s Janet Street-Porter calling him a ‘weirdo.’
She said on the ITV show: ‘In Nella’s defence, I found Fred incredibly patronising,’ she began.
‘I mean, he’s not serving food in a restaurant now, he’s not dealing with difficult customers.
‘I can see that what he said to her could’ve offended her and also, looking at her backstory, her parents came from the Congo, they went to Belgium, both of her parents died within a few months of each other…’
Janet continued: ‘It’s not Fred’s fault and he will not be aware of it, but that will inform how she reacts to him.’
Nella also brilliantly confronted the jungle’s most controversial campmate Nigel Farage over his anti-immigration stance.
Telling him ‘Black people don’t like you’, she pointed out the massive contribution immigrants have made to society and how they have bolstered the NHS.
Challenging him, she stated: ‘I bet you anything if every single immigrant or from immigrant descent was to leave the UK, all your doctors, go… most of your doctors are Asian right? Most of your nurses are African women, right?’
I’m A Celebrity continues tonight at 9pm on ITV and ITVX.
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