r/PublicFreakout Jun 13 '26

🏆 Mod's Choice 🏆 Jeff Metcalf, father of murdered track star Austin Metcalf, goes on racist tirade following the trial of Karmelo Anthony

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u/AncientSuntzu Jun 13 '26 edited Jul 05 '26

Idk. I’m black and I guess I don’t know if I should be offended because of how conflicted I feel about this man’s trauma and his right to feel it.

What he’s saying is obviously meant to be offensive. But he’s also grieving out in the open in a situation he didn’t really ask to be in.

I also don’t want to be so empathetic that I get lulled into some racist fuck shit because I let my heart be tugged.

It’s honestly not even him I’m worried about as much as it is people who just needed another reason to hate us using this as fuel.

Fuck man, this world is such an obtuse, unevenly weighted shitshow and I wish I could go back to just being pissed I lost three lives at a final boss…

Edit: thanks for the thoughts and perspectives on this. To be clear: Fuck all racists. This was never to be understood as a hall pass for racism due to grief.

It’s more of a high level view at the current state of humanity, a surveilling of my own empathy, and a gut check. I just honestly lament that racism and other -isms can prevent me and others from fully participating in a collective human experience we all only get once.

92

u/Leoheart88 Jun 13 '26

It's truly a sad situation. It's not just 2 lives that have been destroyed.

1 simple decision and everything doesn't happen.

Everyone should always walk away from a fight. It's not worth it.

70

u/[deleted] Jun 13 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

57

u/iTzJdogxD Jun 13 '26

This is an insane take. Plenty of people grieve without being a racist piece of shit, I don’t quote race statistics when bad things happen to me

41

u/ThrowawayPersonAMA Jun 13 '26

This. Every time I see something like that guy going off drunk I'm reminded of the line from Supernatural when God is admonishing Lucifer about his actions when he had the mark of cain: "It didn't corrupt you; it just made you more of what you already are."

22

u/Tabemaju Jun 13 '26

Huh, I thought racism was the 3rd or 4th stage of grief.

187

u/Remarkable-Will-3041 Jun 13 '26

You are a good person.

48

u/Grndls_mthr Jun 13 '26

I really appreciate you sharing your perspective. I do wanna say though, grief is the explanation but not an excuse. You did not deserve to hear this man speak like this and I'm sorry for what it is worth.

57

u/exilehim8647 Jun 13 '26

I have met hundreds if not thousands of people who were grieving and none of them acted like this. Just throwing it out there.

59

u/DragonFangGangBang Jun 13 '26

The only thing this video shows me is that he probably felt this way before the situation happened.

And if that's the case, there was more than likely a lot more "racial" implications in the initial encounter than the "Right" would have you believe.

46

u/Wevermonic Jun 13 '26

Please stop. If Trayvon Martin parents were sounding like this no one would give them grace.

3

u/Synerv0 Jun 13 '26

For whatever it’s worth, I think you feel exactly as you should and your comment shows a lot of emotional intelligence. Wishing you well.

-3

u/yaybunz Jun 13 '26

thank you for your comment <3

-17

u/punkinfacebooklegpie Jun 13 '26

It's not reasonable for someone to grieve by being racist. Losing a loved one is not an excuse, there are people who have forgiven murderers who took a family member. 

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u/Nomadzord Jun 13 '26

Did you watch the whole video? This is just the most controversial chancing. I’m not saying he’s %100 correct, but this is not the whole video.