How to Make a Racist a Free-Speech Martyr

Last April, a woman named Shiloh Hendrix went viral after calling a black, autistic, 8-year-old boy the n-word in a Rochester, Minnesota, park and then using the same slur against a man who confronted her about it on camera. After her identity was made public, the online far right decided to make her rich, raising over half a million dollars for her on GiveSendGo, a self-described Christian crowdfunding platform. As I reported at the time, the vast majority of comments from donors on the site were plainly racist, as were the posts on X that portrayed her as a white supremacist folk hero.

It was one of the most clarifying moments of the anti-woke era—an obvious sign that the pendulum had swung too far—and the story should have ended there. But unfortunately, it didn’t—and now, overzealous prosecutors in Rochester have turned Hendrix into a bona fide free-speech martyr.

In the days and weeks that followed the incident, local activists, including the local NAACP chapter, organized protests and town halls demanding that Hendrix be arrested and charged—despite the fact that the incident never escalated to physical violence. A few months later local prosecutors obliged, and Shiloh Hendrix was charged with two misdemeanor counts of disorderly conduct. Last week, she was found guilty on one count (related to her racially insulting the man who filmed her), fined $1,000, and sentenced to probation and community service. The reaction from the far right was exactly what you’d expect.