Former FSU star Dontavious Jackson says he was called N-word, nearly arrested on flight
The athlete used social media to describe a violent, racist experience while traveling on United Airlines
Former star linebacker at Florida State University Dontavious Jackson claimed he was harassed by a family with racial slurs on a recent flight.
He was able to Tweet about the Wednesday, March 17 incident and describe what happened to his followers, in the process calling out United Airlines for allegedly not taking action against the family for their violent, racist behavior toward the former college football star.
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“Was just called a “f*****g ni**er on a United Flight,” Jackson tweeted, tagging the airline company. “And it was caught on video!!”
In a follow-up tweet, he continued, “Add was harassed by a racist family! @united flight attendants just let it happen! Unacceptable!!”
One Twitter user asked if he was okay, to which Jackson responded, “Nope I’m traumatized, United needs to handle this or I’m goin legal.”
He continued to share that although he was the victim, he was targeted as the aggressor and almost taken into custody when law enforcement was called. Jackson shared images of the incident on Twitter and an iMessage conversation with an alleged witness who captured the attack on video.
“After harassing and calling me racial slurs, the family tried to play the victim card, telling the officers I punched/attacked them, which was a lie,” he wrote. “The officer told me if it wasn’t for the witnesses, I would’ve been taken to jail. @united this isn’t right & I’m not staying quiet!”
The text message conversation showed a person confirming that if witnesses had not spoken up with their accounts, Jackson would have been arrested.
Read More: Okla. high school basketball announcer calls Black team the N-word for kneeling
Jackson ended his Twitter venting session with gratitude that the situation did not end with an arrest. “Just grateful to still be a free man smdh,” he shared.
Racist attacks using the n-word are unfortunately not uncommon. Journalist and host Joy Reid claimed conservatives would jump at the opportunity to openly use the derogatory term freely.
“I’ll say it again: people on the right would trade all the tax cuts for the ability to openly say the n-word like in ‘the good old days,’” tweeted the host according to theGrio. “To them, not being able to be openly racist and discriminatory without consequence is oppression. Trump is the avatar for this “freedom.”
Her comments were met with opposition from the conservative crowd.
“Joy Reid of MSNBC: I suggest you watched Hannity. I called you out as a racist. I also suggest you apologize to every Republican in this country. Finally, I suggest you look in the mirror and apologize for your homophobic comments,” tweeted Leo Terrell, a Fox News contributor, theGrio reported.
theGrio has reached out to United Airlines for a statement.
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