LeBron James is a basketball player; but he’s also a Black man. Therefore, like the rest of us, he found whatever that was Kyle Rittenhouse exhibited on the stand Wednesday to be comical AF.
Shortly after video of the 18-year-old Kenosha gunman began making its way around social media, James posted on Twitter: “What tears????? I didn’t see one. Man knock it off! That boy ate some lemon heads before walking into court.” James also added three laughing emojis for emphasis.
Not only was James’ post funny, it was right. Rittenhouse was doing a lot of something, but it wasn’t crying. It was more of a performative labor-breathing shit face, but it wasn’t crying. But that didn’t stop everyone from the judge to the unseasoned of Twitter from coming to Rittenhouse’s rescue, because America has a thing when it comes to white tears.
“LeBron James appears to be mocking people dealing with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) in this post. Why?” asked Aaron Carpenter, a local councilor in Ohio.
“Is this a joke to you? Not a good look!,” the New York Post reports.
You know what’s worse than Rittenhouse’s expressive PTSD? Dying from the shots fired from Rittenhouse’s illegal firearm. Rittenhouse is currently on trial for fatally shooting two people during Wisconsin Black Lives Matter protests.
This is a textbook case of “keep that same energy.”
Rittenhouse was all over the streets of Kenosha with that big-ass gun, so don’t fake-cry now, playboy.
“When you revisit traumatic memories it comes out differently emotionally and/or psychically,” Harminder Singh wrote of Rittenhouse, the Post reports. “Understand the subject before commenting on it,” Singh told James.
Right. James, a Black man who grew up in Cleveland, has no experience with traumatic events or the responses that would occur from them. Got it. I don’t think the owner of said white tears understood that LeBron wasn’t teasing Rittenhouse for crying; he was clowning him for not crying but wanting to tug at the heart of those who don’t believe him to be the thug that he is.
Rittenhouse obtained a gun illegally, carried it to a place where violent interactions were possible, involved himself in situations that had nothing to do with him, and then shot and killed two people.
And then, he wants to cry on the stand. Nah, son. Keep that same energy.
Some of those offended by James’ comments see him as property—of both the NBA and companies that advertise with him. They don’t think the Black man can have an opinion on Black things. They love the basketball player but hate when the Black man says or does some intrinsically Black shit, like laughing at the thug on the stand fake-crying over how scared he was for his life against unarmed protesters while holding his illegal AR-15.
Yeah, it’s time for Rittenhouse to keep that same energy he had when he asked his mom to drive him to the protests. That same energy he had when he armed himself with that illegal firearm. Don’t get on the stand and fake-cry now; that’s not how thugs get down.