According to our good fiends over at TV Deets (via The Daily Mail), Bravo NZ viewers are demanding the network to fire Sloane from the hit reality series. "Julia should be fired. If a RH [Real Housewife] in the USA used a racist & derogatory term like she did, they'd be fired (sic)," one user wrote.
Another posted: "Appalled and disgusted that Julia Sloane would call Michelle a "boat n***er" then felt like a victim when Michelle refused to apologise."
Twitter-verse exploded when Julia apologized to Michelle for the shocking racial slur.
"I would of honestly just thrown her off the boat! No excuse. No room for ignorance when it comes to racism, esp in this day & age (sic)," someone else published.
Since the incident, Julia has reportedly hired lawyers and public relation firm to rebuild her image following the controversial episode.
Stuff reports that Investment banker Michael Lorimer and his wife Julia Sloane sought legal representation in their bid to get an incident in which Sloane calls her co-star Michelle Blanchard a "boat n....." in the sixth episode downplayed.
Bravo NZ initially refused to remove the incident – around which the episode revolves – the episode was ratings winner due to the advance publicity.
Sloane and Lorimer also had reservations about episode four of the reality series, filmed partly at their Matakana vineyard. In that episode, which aired on September 7, Sloane brings out a bag of sex toys while entertaining her co-stars. Among other items, she holds out her husband's cock ring for the women to examine.
The website claims that Sloane asked for amendments to be made to the episode and some footage was cut just days before it aired on Bravo.
Amid the controversy on this week's episode, the couple have one of the public relations industry's heaviest hitters to represent them, Deborah Pead of Pead PR, to defend their image. Pead has gagged her new clients from speaking to media.
However, Pead sent Stuff Sloane's apology for the derogatory comment, which happened while the women were on holiday in Port Douglas, but said Sloane would "not say anything further than what is in the apology".
In her apology, Sloane refers to the incident as "off-camera and off-the-cuff".
"I wasn't thinking, I made a mistake and I have apologised to Michelle for my remark," said Sloane, who is understood to be distressed by the fallout and how it has been handled.
The racial insult was uttered off camera but was caught on microphone. Then the women were filmed speaking about it at length.
"There is no excuse for using offensive words under any circumstances and I have learned from this foolish mistake," said Sloane.
There is some confusion as to what "boat n....." even means. Sloane described it as an old boating term. Blanchard, of English and Jamaican heritage, took it to be a racist slur, as did the other women present.
Race Relations Commissioner Susan Devoy also found it racist saying: "I do not think that ignorant, overt racist behaviour is part of Kiwi culture so we all need to call it out when it rears its very ugly head. People like Julia need to understand that using words like that is not how we roll here. That is not us."
Photo Credit: Bravo NZ