A journalist has come under heavy criticism for a tweet wondering why Hollywood icon, Betty White, had to die instead of Queen Elizabeth II. She has since deleted her Twitter account following the backlash.
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Unusual Reaction
Nylah Burton, who writes for Bustle and also works as a 'sexual assault prevention specialist,' made the comment when news of the death of actress Betty White, 99, broke on Friday.
White's biggest role was as naive Rose Nylund in classic sitcom The Golden Girls. She is the last of the show’s four leads to die.
She would have turned 100 on January 17 and had planned to welcome fans at her 100th birthday party by having it filmed for a documentary titled Betty White: 100 Years Young - A Birthday Celebration.
Burton’s reaction to the news of White’s death was quite unusual and in bad taste. She tweeted:
BETTY WHITE IS DEAD!?! Why couldn't it have been Queen Elizabeth?
'This Account Doesn’t Exist'
Naturally, many people called her out on the impropriety of her joke. Leigh Keystone tweeted in reply:
Just snuck in as the most vile and offensive tweet of 2021. Nylah with a tweet of pure nastiness and hate. You have to feel sorry for these people and their supporters that think such tweets are acceptable. Again the mental illness and hate of leftism strikes.
Commentator Piers Morgan didn’t mince words when he wrote:
Delete this, you disgusting piece of work.
Burton whose work has also appeared in The New York Times, Business Insider, HuffPost, The Independent and Refinery29, initially set her Twitter account to private before taking it down totally. But not before doubling down with another insensitive tweet:
Why not Queen Elizabeth?? The universe took the wrong old white lady smdh
