WATCH: ESPN’s Kirk Herbstreit Is Brought To Tears During Racial Injustice Segment: ‘This Is Not OK’

Phillip NietoSep 5th, 2020, 4:50 pm
 

(Twitter, via @RexChapman)

An emotional Kirk Herbstreit broke down in tears on Saturday during ESPN’s “College GameDay” while discussing the impact that racial injustice has had in the U.S. over the past few months.

“I was talking to David Shaw, the head coach at Stanford,” said Herbstreit, “he shared a quote to me and it reminded me from Benjamin Franklin: ‘Justice will not be served until those who are unaffected are as outraged as those who are.'”

“The Black community is hurting. If you’ve listened, you’ve heard the word empathy and compassion over the last four months.”

“How do you listen to these stories and not feel pain and not want to help?” Herbstreit continued with his voice beginning to crack. “You know what I mean? It’s like wearing a hoodie, putting your hands at 10-2. ‘Oh God, I better look out, because I’m wearing Nike gear,’ like what? What are we talking about?”


“You can’t relate to that if you’re white but you can listen and you can try to help because this is not OK. It’s just not,” he added with tears coming down his face. “We gotta do better, man. We gotta like lock arm and arm and be together. In a football locker room, that’s gone. Those barriers are gone. We gotta do better.”

Over the summer, the U.S. has seen widespread protests in name of “Black Lives Matter” after the death of George Floyd while in the custody of the Minneapolis Police Department. More recently, protests have flared up again after the shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

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