Hollywood star Mark Wahlberg has found himself in hot water this week after he tried to pay tribute to George Floyd, who died in police custody in Minneapolis, Minnesota last month. This move quickly blew up in Wahlberg’s face, as social media users took this opportunity to remind him of his own racially charged past crimes.
Wahlberg was one of many celebrities who took to Instagram to pay tribute to Floyd, posting a photo of him along with the caption, “The murder of George Floyd is heartbreaking. We must all work together to fix this problem. I’m praying for all of us. God bless. #blacklivesmatter.”
It didn’t take long for this to backfire on Wahlberg hard, however, as internet users were quick to point out two incidents from the 1980s in which many believe racism played a role in the star’s violent behavior.
“Remember when you threw rocks at little black girls lmao this isn’t genuine just delete it,” one user commented, with another adding, “Shame on you. After what youve done??? Youre posting this.”
“Haven’t you committed multiple hate crimes that you wanted to get pardoned for? a third user wrote, with another adding, “You have committed hate crimes Mark and have tried to have them expunged from your record. No one will ever forget.”
Fox News reported that the first incident that the social media users appear to have been referring to happened in 1986, when Wahlberg was just 15 years-old. Court papers state that Wahlberg was one of a group of white boys who harassed a group of black fourth-graders in Boston who were on a field trip to the beach by chasing them down a street as they threw rocks at them while also screaming racial slurs. Afterwards, Wahlberg was hit with a civil rights injunction for the incident.
The second incident, which happened in 1988, was far more serious. In this incident, Wahlberg ended up serving time in prison for physically assaulting a Vietnamese shopkeeper, leaving him unconscious and also shouting racial slurs at him simply over a case of beer. Wahlberg ultimately served 45 days behind bars for this, and though he has since apologized publicly, he has also been hit with backlash for trying to get a pardon in 2014.
“I don’t really care who he is. It doesn’t make him any exception. If you’re a racist, you’re always going to be a racist. And for him to want to erase it I just think it’s wrong,” Kristyn Atwood, one of the victims of Wahlberg’s 1986 attack, said after he tried to get a pardon.
In a 2016 interview, Wahlberg admitted that he regretted trying to get the pardon, which he did not end up receiving.
“It was one of those things where it was just kind of presented to me, and if I could’ve done it over again I would never have focused on that or applied,” Wahlberg explained of the pardon application. “I didn’t need that, I spent 28 years righting the wrong. I didn’t need a piece of paper to acknowledge it. I was kind of pushed into doing it, I certainly didn’t need to or want to relive that stuff over again.”
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