She was so exhausted she slumped to the ground after finishing the race which is inspired by a famous prison escape.
The course, at Frozen Head State Park, changes every year but covers 100 miles involving 60,000ft of climb and descent - about twice the height of the Mount Everest.
Only 20 people have ever made it to the end of the race within the allotted 60 hours since it was extended to 100 miles in 1989.
The idea for the race came when they heard about the 1977 escape of James Earl Ray, the assassin of Martin Luther King Jr, from nearby Brushy Mountain State Penitentiary.
Prospective runners must write a “Why I should be allowed to run in the Barkley” essay along with a $1.60 (£1.27) entrance fee and if successful get a letter of condolence.
Competitors must find between nine and 14 books along the course (the exact number varies each year) before removing the page corresponding to their race number from each book as proof of completion.
What in cracker fucking hell. You know you could just fucking lie about your motives, right?
The summary mentions this detail and completely omits the rest of that section:
So it appears to be an extended exercise in mocking the asshole, which I wholeheartedly approve of.
Honestly the summary could’ve omitted the origins, or given it that crucial context. Giving the first sentence and not the rest is like the worst way to summarise that and it’s a big issue to just leave out. I would’ve included all of that because frankly it’s hilarious.
Damn they should’ve lead with that. That’s actually hilarious. Fuck that guy.
Yup, and there’s definitely people in this thread that really want to say “ackshually it’s not racist” but then are working really hard to give the impression that the race is simply neutral about the man himself. It’s almost like those people don’t want to admit that it’s actually anti-racist and based as fuck.
EDIT: I don’t want to vague-post about this. This is what the person in question actually said:
That’s fucked up, right? If they knew… how did they so specifically avoid explaining what the race is actually about?
Yup, not sure why I got attacked and downvoted for this, it’s pretty fucking clear that the summary tells a different story than the article. But hey it’s par for the course on here, where outrage is performative, and real rage is frown upon.
I’ve also noticed an interesting trend from way back on Reddit, but there’s always some reactionary who uses one of the GBU bombs as their nickname.
Give a reactionary even the slightest chance to “well ackshually” away racism and they’ll jump on it. They’re not generally correct about things, so if they have a chance to be technically correct it’s like catnip. It’s fascinating how easy it would have been to explain the situation but this GBU person wanted them to be all “no comment” about it, as if that would have been an acceptable answer. It’s almost like they didn’t want to acknowledge the actual anti-racist motivations.
And yeah, I thought the GBU thing was familiar. I can’t find anything about it being a dogwhistle though, it’s not an easy thing to google.
EDIT: Maybe it’s not a dogwhistle, it could easily refer to guided bombs. Maybe it’s just one person with way too much time on their hands.
Well said! Yes it’s a reference to the guided bomb, that’s what I’m saying. He’s not the only one I’ve seen back in the Reddit days.
Do you feel the obligation to be outraged by the most pointless things or does it come naturally?
Reading only the excerpt and knowing nothing else about the race, yeah I think it’s pretty fucking normal to be outraged. If it didn’t raise an eyebrow for you I find that very fucking suspicious.
The race and it’s organizers have nothing to do with, and make no comment on the motivation or the reason for imprisonment of the person.
It’s just about the escape, and the terrain covered, specifically. The point is he didn’t make it far on that terrain and the competitors do so much more.
They have willingly associated themselves with it after the fact, and to make no comment on what is an extremely dark chapter of American history seems pretty irresponsible. It would take absolutely no effort at all to say, “we are not valorising this man”, so not doing it is quite telling.
If that is true and you have it from the organisers, then they have made some comment on the man himself. Could you share how you know about this?
Go read about the race, it’s literally to mock the dude, the organizer said that could run more, as a burn
Okay, reading the article itself and not just the summary:
So it’s just that the summary leaves out this information, which if they’re going to mention the origins of the race is a pretty crucial detail to omit.
I have to say though, when you say they “make no comment on the motivation or the reason for imprisonment of the person” it really does create the impression they’re being neutral in the matter, which they obviously aren’t. I’m glad you explained more.
Well they don’t describe the crime, or emit a stance on it, which makes sense, it’s a trail race not a political or social justice platform.
Look, the issue here is clearly that the race appeared crypto-racist on that summary, and instead of clearly explaining the issue, you stated exactly the things that the race organisers are neutral on, which seems to almost surgically sidestep the clearly anti-racist motivations. You weren’t technically wrong, but you can walk up to literally anyone on the street and say “you’re going to die” and you’re not wrong, but they’d want know why you were saying it.
This is about framing. There are infinite details in the universe, the trick with communication is to filter down to the important, salient details.
Step 2 of being outraged by an auto generated summary would ideally be to read the actual article to get more context before expressing that outrage.
I don’t think the issue being raised here is that you were outraged by the excerpt, it’s that the excerpt was trusted at face value enough to mislead folks, and it seems people just double down after being misled by the auto generated excerpt.
The best way to remember an assassin is to make fun of how actually inept they are.
Keep reading bud
“We thought hey, what better an idea than paying homage to the escape of the guy who killed MLK?”
Some people…
It is not a homage, it’s a mockery. It does retrace part of his escape, but goes 10x as far over much, much more brutal terrain. The race started as a joke about what a wimp the guy was to only cover 12 miles in 50hrs of running.
There is a documentary about the race called "the race that eats its young" that is excellent if you want to learn more.
I dunno, Cantrell seems kinda gleefully obtuse about the inspiration in the trailer. Now, I don’t think he’s intending to say anything nice about Ray, but there’s just something offputting about how casual he is about it, like he thinks the main cultural legacy of James Earl Ray is being bad at cross-country running. I guess not the end of the world, but… tacky.
Well, just from a media literacy stance, watching 90 seconds of a movie trailer and then deciding the blatantly irreverent presenter of a grueling triathlon/art piece that invites global participation is secretly a supporter of a racist murderer, is probably not rock solid analysis.
I can tell you as someone who watched the documentary in it entirely, dug deeper into the history afterwards, and has an ultra marathoner friend i’ve discussed it with, that I did not come to the same conclusion.
The fact of the matter is that the race has basically nothing to do with that piece of shit murderer. His sad ass escape may have been the inspiration 45 years ago for a joke that became an art piece that became a grueling ultra marathon, but now it is very much about the race. At no point do they venerate or even wink at the shithead. The closest they get i nthe documentary is that part of the race in 2014 involved wading through a stream that goes under the abandoned prison, but even that is just designed to plunge the runners and their many wounds into ice cold water over and over again as they lap the course over 60 insane hours.
You can read more about the man and the some times madcap race criteria here. they average 1000 applicants/yr now, but only accept 40.
As an example of the irreverence, of the 40 runners allowed each year, 1 runner who is deemed unqualified is allowed entry as the “human sacrifice.” They are given bib #1.
There is often a race fee of “a clean pair of socks” or tshirts, which he wears during the race. He demands “$1.60 and a license plate from your home country or state” as the entry fee.
Glad to hear it, and I hope was pretty explicit in stating I didn’t think he actually supported James Earl Ray. He comes off more as somebody who’s up his own ass than a crypto-racist.
Again, not the end of the world, just a bit tone deaf.
Again, 90 seconds of trailer isn’t exactly a great amount of source material for your conclusion, but okay then.
Dudes only “up his own ass” in the sense that he runs a brutal series of marathons in a whimsical fashion. He “keeps austin weird” basically, even if it is in Tennessee.
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In the article they explain that by naming a 100 mile ultramarathon after him, they’re mocking Ray because he only made it 12 miles.
Point of clarification - the race is NOT named after the shooter, instead it was named after the organizers friend.
Oh. Well, uh, we are talking about him again, so. Maybe attaching a race to him in any way is . . . not optimal.
I hope the extensive list of articles, documentary links, and general feedback is enough to inspire a tasteful edit of something like “wow, I learned and that guy is great at making fun of the guy who shot MLK.”