Anthony Joshua has hit back at criticism of his impassioned speech at Saturday's Black Lives Matter rally in his home town of Watford.

World heavyweight champion Joshua spoke out against looting and rioting and urged demonstrators to protest peacefully during the march, which was held in the wake of George Floyd's death last month.

While the 30-year-old's address garnered plenty of support on social media, he also faced a backlash after reading out a speech from somebody who could not attend.

An excerpt from the speech was uploaded to social media in which Joshua said: "Show them where it hurts.

“Abstain from spending your money in their shops and economies, and invest in black-owned businesses.”

The excerpt attracted some fierce criticism, with some labelling the speech as racist and others saying they would boycott Joshua's pay-per-view fights.

But Joshua has taken to Twitter to defend himself, clarifying that he was reading out somebody else's words, and pointing out that he also spoke personally about investing in his community to help forge unity.

Joshua's tweet on Sunday evening read: "If you think I’m a racist, go f**k yourself!

“If you watch the full video, the speech was passed around for someone to read and I took the lead.

“I personally spoke from the heart about the Watford community, ideas of us personally investing seven figures to create unity and opportunities and adding change to the African/Caribbean community.

“Shops aren’t the issue here. Before you talk s**t, you better boycott racism.

"I said what I said and will act to make the change."

Source: https://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/boxing/anthony-joshua-hits-back-criticism-22154154

E no go better for Derek Chauvin, J. Alexander Kueng, Thomas Lane and Tou Thao.....Racist Cops

So if Tyson fury come out tommorow con say "whites buy only from whites shop" e go like am

W

AJ no mind them..

Racism is such a sensitive matter
you can't fight bad with bad.. it only brings more bad
blacks in America are a minority.. so there's not so much you can do to "show them where it hurts"
we just have to take this as it is... I don't see racism ending because of speeches and protests, we've been doing that for decades now

check out the link in my signature.. get paid for watching long YouTube vids.. registration is free.. no strings attached
I have no reason to scam you

ok

I don't expect anything less from him...he is already a slave to be the white man

Oga no just rant online, go out and punch somebody.

Blacks are the only one that take offence because someone says they are black

Foolish low self esteemed sets of people

Come back home and leave the city of whites

Anthony Joshua is talking too much these days. Focus on your training

I am black but you see all this protest by the black community and riots going on freely is simply because of excessive freedom and how liberal the western world had open up to people. I have traveled to 9 countries and I must say, I feel more attached and comfortable mingling with white folks than the blacks.
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Where in the world aside the western world can you travel from GOd knows where and give birth to a child and the child automatically become a full citizen enjoying same privilege as the indigenous people. Where in the world can you automatically get citizenship by marrying a citizen. I studied in the UK, your child automatically get access to free education, health care and a lot of facilities by the virtue of your student status in the west. A lot of students exploit the system especially those on scholarship by bringing their spouse and children while on study, thereby overstretching the limited resources. Go to the hospital and see indigenous white queuing for appointments that might take close to a month before they get access to see a doctor because a lot of people both foreigners and citizen had booked earlier. They were overwhelmed by such things and displayed decorum in votes to pull out of EU rather than following the path of fellow BLACK xenophobic South Africans displayed some time ago.
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See, typically the black man in a white man’s country is so sensitive to how the white react, speak or even look at him and point to racism at every instance. I had a friend who worked in a bar and was dismissed because of his carelessness and poor attitude to work...before he left the bar he made sure he created a scene shouting racism racism. They were so courteous not to respond or engage him in a fight because they know most of the black Africans use racism to cover their shits.

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Now we have phrases like black excellence, black live matters, I am black and proud, black history....flip the coin and say something like white supremacy, white excellence, white rules and hell will be let loose from the black community pointing racism. What sort of inferiority can that be?
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Lastly, you see this Arab countries or most Asian countries.. nobody do racism pass them, but why don’t the suppressed black population protest...because the freedom is limited and they make sure you understand from your first presence in the country that you are second class to them and nothing can change that. Anyway, as the saying goes...when you give somebody a yard he will later ask for a mile.

A man is only respected and modelled if he earns such. Look at the African continent, the poorest, the most docile, the most disease ravaged, the most corrupt, the most backward...who has ever earned respect by displaying such attributes??

C

I am really not caring about black lives matter thing.

African Americans are the worst racist

You're better with a whitemam in America than an African American. Trust me

Give them dead meat suya AJ

AJ fumbled

Racism is bad

Some people are expert in looking for faults where there's none.

fault finders well done oo

African Americans are more rasict towards their African counterparts than whites. Stupid people

That was racist jorrr

Hometown of Watford, lol shebi ndi sophisticated said he's from ijebu ode?

Goodmen don't keep silence in the face of tyranny

AJ got that wrong

AJ, original naija boy. Omoluabi.

v

what can I say,I don't know,I am out

Hmm. Okay man. It wasn't his speech.

But, doesn't reading a racist speech also make you morally culpable and an accomplice of racism even though you aren't racist ideologically.

Okay, I'm not a killer and I don't support killing but I help my friend commit murder because he's indisposed. It's not my fault eh? I'm innocent. Right?