In the wake of Karmelo Anthony’s swift conviction for the cold-blooded murder of 17-year-old Austin Metcalf, and his sentencing to 35 years in prison last week, a predictable chorus of race hustlers has emerged to defend the indefensible.
On Monday, June 15, 2026, Sangamon County Board Member Reggie Guyton shared a Facebook post from a person named Daniel Collins which reads like a manifesto for the modern woke left: relentless victim-blaming of the murdered white teen, and a full-throated pivot to “systemic racism,” generational trauma, reparations, and every other grievance in the progressive playbook.
His post perfectly encapsulates the toxic ideology that excuses and even permits violence when the perpetrator checks the right racial box—and demands the rest of America carry the burden of endless racial atonement.
On April 2, 2025, at a Frisco, Texas, track meet, 17-year-old Karmelo Anthony entered the Memorial High School tent during a rain delay. Multiple witnesses told him to leave. Anthony refused. He warned, “Touch me and see what happens,” while reaching into his bag where he had stashed a 3.5-inch blade. Austin Metcalf, a 17-year-old Memorial athlete pushed him on the shoulder after Anthony’s refusal to leave. Anthony responded by plunging the knife straight into Austin’s chest, piercing his heart. Anthony then fled the scene.
Guyton’s post waves away these facts with a cascade of false equivalences. He calls the murder weapon a “6-in-1 multi-tool” sold at Walmart for $13—conveniently omitting that Anthony used it to kill an unarmed teenager over a shove. “Many athletes used this to clean their cleats,” he claims. Anthony didn’t use it on his cleats – he used it to stab Austin Metcalf in the heart.
Guyton’s post performs one of the oldest tricks in the woke playbook: inversion of victim and attacker: Why did Austin “greet him with such hostility”? Why did Austin “feel entitled”? Why did Austin “attack”?
Translation: The dead kid brought it on himself by daring to tell an intruder to get out of his team’s tent. In Guyton’s world, enforcing basic boundaries is “hostility” and “entitlement” when done by a white person. Refusing to leave, issuing a threat, and stabbing someone in the heart? That’s just a scared black child acting in “fear for his life.”
Austin Metcalf wasn’t “entitled.” He was enforcing boundaries at his own school event. Karmelo Anthony wasn’t a victim. He chose violence. The jury affirmed what common sense demands: Actions have consequences.
Apparently, Reggie Guyton believes the just consequence for pushing someone is to be stabbed in the heart.
Reggie Guyton demands we grieve for the killer’s and label the victim’s perfectly reasonable actions as the real crime.
Justice was served for Austin Metcalf. If anything, Anthony’s punishment was far too lenient. Anthony is eligible for parole after serving 50% of his sentence.
The rest of us should reject the woke grievance machine that turns a killer into a martyr and a murdered boy into the villain.