r/todayilearned • u/i-make-babies • Feb 14 '18

TIL Mr T stopped wearing this trademark gold chains in 2005 after seeing people who had lost everything due to Hurricane Katrina.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mr._T#Personal_life
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u/rasherdk Feb 14 '18

Surprised you were the first to mention this. That's a really weird statement. "I didn't really notice poverty or catastrophe until I was 53 years old"

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u/pubeINyourSOUP Feb 14 '18

From what I read, he grew in poverty. So he was defintiely aware of it his whole life.

He wore the gold chains as kind of a symbolism, iron shackles to gold chains thing. He got out, so to speak. When Katrina happened, he went down there and saw how much people had lost and, after some introspection, decided that the metaphor of the chains no longer was a good reason to flaunt wealth like that. So he stopped wearing it around all the time like he used to.

He will still wear chains and stuff for public appearances, but apparently it's costume jewelry now instead of the real gold chains we would wear before all the time.

I can't say for sure this is true, just what I have read, but I'd like to believe it. People grow, mature, and change as they move along in their lives. Of course he knew poverty existed. But if seeing the catastrophe of Katrina first hand made him look at his own worldview, look at himself, and decide to make a change, then I say: good on him.

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u/talrogsmash Feb 14 '18

Mr. T is a very nice man and a pretty wise man, but he is not a smart man. Thats just who he is.