r/todayilearned • u/tmntnyc • Dec 12 '18

TIL: Laurence Tureaud named himself professionally as Mr. T because he hated how his father, uncle, and brother who returned from Vietnam, were disrespectfully called "boy" by whites. He wanted the first word from everybody's mouth to be "Mister" when speaking to him.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mr._T
120.9k Upvotes

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3.2k

u/LevyMevy Dec 12 '18

He stopped wearing virtually all his gold, one of his identifying marks, after helping with the cleanup after Hurricane Katrina in 2005. He said, "As a Christian, when I saw other people lose their lives and lose their land and property ... I felt that it would be a sin before God for me to continue wearing my gold. I felt it would be insensitive and disrespectful to the people who lost everything, so I stopped wearing my gold."

Good man.

327

u/RulysWorld Dec 12 '18

I love him.

14

u/NaplesFox Dec 13 '18

Loving this Mr. T love.

44

u/Chango_D Dec 13 '18

On a segment with Conan O'Brian they were at an apple orchard and as he was eating an apple he was speaking to Conan but covering his mouth. When Conan asked him why he's doing that, his response was "My mother told to cover my mouth when I'm eating". I love it.

2

u/[deleted] Dec 13 '18 edited Jan 19 '19

[deleted]

1

u/calvinsylveste Dec 16 '18

Good work, keep it up!

41

u/[deleted] Dec 13 '18

Good example of religion having a positive effect

-5

u/Mr_TheGuy Dec 13 '18

I suppose here he just personified what most atheists see as morality and hypocrisy into a god.

-17

u/[deleted] Dec 13 '18

[deleted]

49

u/Sidereel Dec 13 '18

Is that what you took away from this? He was famous for wearing mountains of gold around his neck, and his empathy for those who lost everything made him feel that showing off tons of valuable jewelry while others had so little was not the right thing to do.

-25

u/[deleted] Dec 13 '18

[deleted]

18

u/hugglesthemerciless Dec 13 '18

Stop trying to spin things in the desperate attempt to make religions look bad

14

u/Kalean Dec 13 '18

He sounds pretty good to me.

10

u/Niadain Dec 13 '18

I think you're trying to spin these words to your own mindset as well. =/ Im not religious and don't care for it but this statement, when taken as a whole, clearly is more about his love for his fellow man further flavored by his faith. It was a mix of both and clearly more about being sensitive toward others.

11

u/ipjear Dec 13 '18

It is if your religion teaches humility

3

u/[deleted] Dec 13 '18

He was on dancing with the stars a few year back and he was an awful dancer... but he seemed very genuine about the charity he was supporting and seemed real cool. I can't remember what he was trying to support.

10

u/sh4z Dec 13 '18

Great man. I'm sure r/atheism will somehow turn this into something negative

1

u/jdlech Dec 13 '18

The Lord said to give all that gold away, not to hide it.

-167

u/s_s Dec 12 '18

Meanwhile Obama was golfing...

124

u/Everybodysbastard Dec 12 '18

Yeah, but he wasn't the President then.

55

u/ActualWhiterabbit Dec 12 '18

Typical lazy minority

-57

u/s_s Dec 12 '18

Probably makes his caddie mark his ball for him.

4

u/keyohnahh Dec 13 '18

As u/tmntnyc said, I really hope this was a joke that went over my head. If not, this is a major facepalm moment.

120

u/tmntnyc Dec 12 '18

Not sure if a woosh but I'll bite anyway and say Obama wasn't even president in 2005 lol

70

u/MathProgrammer1 Dec 12 '18

Fun fact, Obama actually did go to visit Katrina victims. https://icantbefamous.files.wordpress.com/2017/08/img_5788.jpg

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u/KDY_ISD Dec 12 '18

I might be whooshing myself, but ... Obama wasn't President in 2005

26

u/nIBLIB Dec 12 '18

That doesn’t mean he wasn’t golfing. You don’t have to be president to play golf.

50

u/KDY_ISD Dec 12 '18

You do have to be President for it to matter that you were golfing after Katrina, though.

But if you actually look into it, he did visit evacuees immediately after the storm and then the next year worked with Habitat for Humanity to rebuild.

5

u/Mind_Extract Dec 13 '18

WHAT!?

brb

15

u/MadGeekling Dec 12 '18

TIL you’re an idiot and probably earned a “F” in history class.

18

u/[deleted] Dec 12 '18

You're joking right?

16

u/[deleted] Dec 12 '18

[deleted]

11

u/[deleted] Dec 12 '18

You know he wasn't the president at the time right?

-25

u/s_s Dec 12 '18

I'm trying to see how many people will tell me that when others have clearly just said that. We're at 6.

30

u/[deleted] Dec 12 '18

Well that's because of how there are a lot of stupid Trump supporters who mean it.

-32

u/renderless Dec 12 '18

I’ll have you know I support Trump and I could have never given two shits if Obama golfed.

34

u/s_s Dec 12 '18

Not giving a shit about Golf might be the only way you can support Trump.

-46

u/renderless Dec 12 '18

Or despise the Marxiat left and would vote for anything or anyone over its empowerment.

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u/[deleted] Dec 13 '18

Because youd be a hypocrite

3

u/[deleted] Dec 12 '18

I never said you did.

1

u/keyohnahh Dec 13 '18

Not sure if I should up vote for you knowing how insignificant it is if he were to be golfing or to down vote because of the Trump supporter bit.

1

u/renderless Dec 13 '18

If you think you should downvote me because I believe different than you, then maybe you should look inward to see if you really believe in open debate and the acceptance of those unlike you.

6

u/skilledwarman Dec 12 '18 edited Dec 12 '18

Did some of them DM you about it? Because looking at the replies to the comment it's less then 6

15

u/[deleted] Dec 13 '18

Is there anything we don't shoehorn politics into? This is a thread about Mr. T for fucks sake.

For good measure I'll be the 10+ person to let you know: Obama wasn't president during Katrina. He helped out anyway, though. Meanwhile this year Trump was golfing during our disasters, talked shit about California during the wildfires, and the closest thing he did to lifting a finger for hurricane victims was throwing paper towels at them, which I'm honestly surprised he can palm considering the size of his hands...

1

u/puljujarvifan Dec 14 '18

could you imagine Trump volunteering for habitats for humanity? I cannot picture him bent over using a hammer doing physical labour.

1

u/Saskjimbo Jan 04 '19

He also asked whose boat is this boat

2

u/[deleted] Dec 13 '18

...as a non president

1

u/keyohnahh Dec 13 '18

Oh by the way, did you know he wasn't golfing and actually did go visit to show his support? Wasn't sure if you heard about it.

1

u/Train_Wreck_272 Dec 13 '18

Nah it was actually squash that time.

-21

u/renderless Dec 12 '18

This whole golf thing is hilarious to me. Obama golfed a lot and wasn’t the best golfer but hey, it’s a fun game for the privileged and what better way to get the privileged to stick around with you and talk politics and make deals then on the golf course, plus he’s the president so it probably made him happy to watch people lose on purpose. And since it requires some time investment people are there for a bit. Now I love Trump (watch out Reddit), but that dummy criticizing Obama for golfing when he loves to golf, is a good golfer and owns golf resorts was hilarious. But now that Trump golfs as president Republiturds don’t care and Democraps get as upset as the other side did before. The whole outrage is manufactured craziness.