Rebel Wilson, Sydney Morning Herald: Whoopi Goldberg slams Australian newspaper for ‘outing’ star

American talk show host Whoopi Goldberg has slammed an Australian newspaper for attempting to ‘out’ Rebel Wilson before she went public with her new girlfriend Ramona Agruma on Friday.

Sydney Morning Herald columnist Andrew Hornery published a column on Saturday in which he hit out at Wilson’s decision to ‘gazump’ his scoop, arguing he’d found out about the relationship and was going to publish a story about it.

Goldberg said on The View: ‘There’s a lot of speculation that Rebel came out to get ahead of a tabloid story in the Sydney Morning Herald about her relationship.

‘Now, the man who wrote it even apologised, saying it was “never his intention to out her”… Well, you know that’s not true.’

She continued: ‘If it wasn’t your intention, you wouldn’t have done it. If you didn’t want to do it, you shouldn’t have done it. You knew exactly what you were doing.’

The View co-host Sara Haines then weighed in, pointing out that Hornery is gay himself and therefore should have known better.

‘You’d think he’d have a unique empathy to how people come to those decisions when they’re ready,’ she said.

Sydney Morning Herald columnist Andrew Hornery published a column on Saturday in which he hit out at Wilson’s decision to ‘gazump’ his scoop, arguing he’d found out about the relationship and was going to publish a story about it. (Pictured: Wilson and Ramona Agruma)

‘If it wasn’t your intention [to out Wilson] you wouldn’t have done it,’ a furious Goldberg said on The View this week

Haines went on to say she personally ‘wouldn’t trust’ the media with such a sensitive story.

‘It’s sad that they’re in this situation that they have to release these things they’re not ready to talk about, but I think that’s the better way to own the narrative,’ she said.

‘I would not give a quote or talk to a place that’s forcing me to tell a story that I’m not ready to tell.’

Sunny Hostin agreed, calling the entire situation ‘horrible’.

The View co-host Sara Haines (pictured) then weighed in, pointing out that Hornery is gay himself and therefore should have known better

Sunny Hostin (pictured) agreed with her co-hosts, calling the entire situation ‘horrible’ 

It comes after Hornery apologised for the ‘tone’ of his controversial Rebel Wilson article, and said it was never his intention to ‘inflict pain’ when he reached out to ask about her new relationship with Ramona Agruma.

Hornery admitted he had learned some new and difficult lessons from the scandal.

‘I genuinely regret that Rebel has found this hard. That was never my intention. But I see she has handled it all with extraordinary grace,’ he wrote in a column that replaced Sunday’s article online.

‘As a gay man I’m well aware of how deeply discrimination hurts. The last thing I would ever want to do is inflict that pain on someone else.’

It comes after Hornery (pictured) apologised for the ‘tone’ of his controversial Rebel Wilson article, and said it was never his intention to ‘inflict pain’ when he reached out to ask about her new relationship with Ramona Agruma 

Hornery said he thought his article would be a ‘happy story’ after seeing several months of photos of the couple together on Wilson’s Instagram page.

‘I assumed there was a good chance she might be happy to discuss it,’ he explained.

‘She had already revealed a month ago that she had been dating and was very happy.’

The gossip columnist said he never meant his request for comment to be a threat, but rather to ‘make it clear’ that he was ‘sufficiently confident with his information and to open a conversation’.

‘I assumed there was a good chance she might be happy to discuss it,’ Hornery explained. ‘She had already revealed a month ago that she had been dating and was very happy’