Liam Neeson has responded to the fuss that arose after an interview in which he revealed that he had ever set out to beat a random dark man. The Northern Irish actor says he is not a racist.
In the interview with the British newspaper The Independent , Neeson shared the story that a friend of his was once raped by a dark man. The 66-year-old actor then wanted to indulge his revenge on a random dark man and was shocked by his own aggression.
Neeson tells in Good Morning America on Tuesday that the incident occurred forty years ago and that he had just started looking for a man with a light complexion if the perpetrator had met that description. “If she had said it had been Irish, Scottish, Brit or Let, it would have had the same effect.”
The revelation of Neeson’s attempt at revenge caused a lot of fuss on social media. The Northern Irishman was labeled as a racist and there was also a call to boycott the work of the actor.
Actor was shocked by ‘primitive urge’
The actor understands that his words have been misinterpreted. Neeson also tells that he sought help at the time to look at where that aggression came from. “I was shocked by the primitive urge I had, it shocked me and hurt me.”
Neeson hopes that his story encourages people to say more often what they think. “We all pretend to be politically correct to a greater or lesser extent.”
