Daytime talk-show host Ellen DeGeneres is being sued by a viewer over the mispronunciation of her name, which just so happens to resemble a popular slang term for breasts.
In a February 2016 segment titled “What’s Wrong With These Signs?” on Ellen, the show displayed a collection of strange or otherwise off-colour real-estate signs. Not mean-spirited by any stretch, the bit was meant to be funny.
But Georgia woman Titi Pierce isn’t laughing, and is suing DeGeneres for the “emotional distress” she’s been under since the segment aired.
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DeGeneres read the sign as “Titty Pierce,” even though Pierce pronounces her name as “Tee Tee.” According to the lawsuit, she claims that no one has ever pronounced her name as “Titty” in “her 35 years of life.”
Pierce says she has received vulgar phone calls and been harassed by strangers ever since the broadcast, blaming the show for not blurring out her phone number. As a real estate agent and electronics engineer, she claims this is detrimental to her career and personal life.
In the lawsuit, she recounts an incident when she was travelling to the funeral of a family member at the same time the segment was airing. She began to receive calls from multiple unknown numbers, and when she answered, she was mocked by “cruel voices.”
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“As a direct and proximate result of the Defendant’s conduct, Ms. Pierce has suffered stress, emotional distress, embarrassment, humiliation, anger and other mental pain and suffering,” the lawsuit reads.
DeGeneres has not publicly commented on the lawsuit.
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