O racista arrependido / Regreting racist

Bryon Widner rejeitou suas crenças racistas, que o haviam tornado uma figura notória entre a extrema direita americana, e está lutando para se readaptar á sociedade, por causa das tatuagens de teias que lhe cobriam o rosto e o pescoço.

Widner não conseguia arranjar emprego após mudar de vida, para melhor.

O racista arrependido, fundador da gangue de skinheads, de Ohio, EUA, submeteu-se a uma dolorosa série de 25 cirurgias, ao longo de 16 meses, que lhe custaram US$32,400.

A mulher de Widner, Julie diz que o caminho da remoção das tauagens foui longo e penoso. Ela temia que Widner pudesse recorrer a medidas drásticas para remover as tatuagens, e o casal penou para pagar pelos procedimentos.

"Nós fomos tão longe," disse ela. "Havíamos deixado o movimento, constituímos uma boa família. Tínhamos muitas razões para viver. Eu só pensava na possibilidade de alguém de fora nos ajudar."

"Eu estava a ponto de destruir meus rosto com ácido," disse Widner.

Julie então fez algo que o casal jamais imaginaria em sua vida anteriormente, a foram em busca do auxílio de homem...negro.


Daryle Lamont Jenkins coordena um grupo anti-intolerância, chamado One People's Project (Projeto de um Povo) da Filadélfia, Pennsylvania, que pôs  Widner em contato com um ex- neonazista.

"Nada importava quem ela havia sido antes, ou suas crenças anteriores," disse Jenkins. "Aqui estava uma mulher e mãe pronta a fazer qualquer coisa por sua família."

Bryon Widner rejected the racist beliefs that had made him a notorious figure amongst the American extreme Right, but was struggling to readapt to society because of the web of tattoos that covered his face and neck.

Widner, known as an "enforcer" for US racist groups, was unable to find a job after leaving his past behind.

The former racist, a founder of the Vinlanders gang of skinheads in Ohio, embarked on a painful series of 25 surgeries that took 16 months and cost $32,400.

Widner's wife Julie says the path to removing the tattoos was a long, painful journey. She feared Widner would take drastic measures to remove the tattoos as the couple struggled to pay for the procedures.

"We had come so far," she says. "We had left the movement, had created a good family life. We had so much to live for. I just thought there has to be someone out there who will help us."

"I was totally prepared to douse my face in acid," Widner says.

 

Julie then did something that the couple would have found unimaginable in their previous lives and approached a black man for help.


Daryle Lamont Jenkins runs an anti-hate group called One People's Project based in Philadelphia, who put Widner in touch with a reformed neo-Nazi.

"It didn't matter who she had once been or what she had once believed," Jenkins said. "Here was a wife and mother prepared to do anything for her family."