About

Epic Beard Man is the nickname for Oakland resident Thomas Bruso that was coined after a video in which he repeatedly punches a younger black man, identified only as Michael, was spread online in February of 2010.

Origin

On February 16th, 2010, Iyanna Washington, a college student from Oakland, CA (YouTube user "iyannaw08") uploaded a video titled "AC TRANSIT BUS FIGHT I AM A MOTHERFUCKER." It featured footage she recorded of a 50 year old black man and a 67 year old white man wearing a T-shirt that reads "I AM A MOTHERFUCKER" having a heated argument fueled by racial ignorance resulting in a violent physical confrontation (shown below, left). That same day, Iyanna Washington uploaded another video footage capturing the aftermath of the fight, with Bruso continuing to throw a tantrum in the street after stepping out of the bus (shown below, right).

Transcript

Black man: …AC Transit
Bruso: Let's get back to business. How much you charge me for a spit-shine?
Black man: what?
Bruso: How much you charge me for my Stacy Adams? I'm going to a funeral on Friday…You said you… [note: Stacy Adams are a brand of shoe.]
Black man: Did you get what I said just now?
Bruso: Yes
Black man: Why a brother gotta spit-shine your shoes?
Bruso: You offered!
Black man: I didn't offer you shit.

Identity

The older white man in the video was subsequently identified as Thomas Bruso, a.k.a. Tom Slick,, a.k.a. Vietnam Tom; infamous in Oakland for his reputation of belligerence. Prior to the discovery of his identity, Anonymous had already dubbed him "Epic Beard Man." After the black man's nose is broken, he says "bring an ambulance" which has been misheard as both "bring M&M's" and "bring Amber Lamps" due to a combination of his dialect and facial injury. "Amber Lamps" has since become associated with the mysterious girl sitting next to the black man in the video.

Spread

Within the first 24 hours, the video amassed over 1 million views and spawned a series of threads on 4chan's /b/ (random) board where hundreds of various image macros have been created. A website at the domain IAmMotherFucker.com previously displayed Iyanna Washington's videos, underneath a header that reads "find his bag and return it." It has since been taken down. Most of the comments on the site proclaim EBM (Epic Beard Man) to be a tragic hero, standing up for the rights for some supposed oppression of white people by black people. The website ThomasBruso.com was also created (it has since been removed), featuring the original video and links to the Epic Beard Man macro creator on Memegenerator^[2], the Thomas Bruso wiki (since been removed) and an article on Encyclopedia Dramatica.^[3] The single serving site Epicbeardman.com contains the original video, and several derivatives.^[4] In addition, there is an Epic Beard Man Facebook fan page^[5] as well as an Epic Beard Guy Twitter account^[6].

News Media Coverage

Several news articles about the viral video were published on Metafilter^[7], Deadspin^[8], Holy Taco^[9], and Urlesque.^[10] The day after the video was uploaded, CBS 5 caught up with Iyanna Washington and interviewed her. The video is available by CBS 5 has been mirrored on YouTube (embedded below). In the interview, Iyanna alleges that both men may have been under the influence of drugs and/or alcohol. She also reveals that eventually, Bruso voluntarily put his hands behind his back, surrendering to his arresting officers. Some have criticized CBS 5 for failing to mention how Iyanna encouraged the black man in the video to "beat his (Bruso's) white ass."

CBS 5: What do you think about that entire incident. In a word or a phrase?
Iyanna: Oakland. laughs
CBS 5: I mean, what word would you use to describe what happened?
Iyanna: Ridiculous. Just Ridiculous. Crazy.

Reaction Videos

Some have created videos sharing their views of the video. The thing they all have in common is that most enjoy watching Epic Beard Man's retaliation against the black man.

Prior Incidents

In a video uploaded on August 5th, 2009 Thomas Bruso is tased by police for being drunk and disorderly at an Oakland A's baseball game.

Photographer Troy Holden mentioned previous encounters he has had with Tom Bruso.

"Back in 1996, I was working at the intersection of 2nd & Market. Each and every day the man pictured above would walk by my shop, wave a loaf of sourdough in my face, and scream obscenities about the San Francisco 49′ers.

Eventually, I moved on and just assumed this fellow found something better to do with his time. I guess not." ^[13]

Anonymous Operation

Late on the night of February 16th, Anonymous began Operation: I AM A MOTHERFUCKER, a somewhat typical cooperative effort to find and disseminate the address, telephone number, and social networks of Iyanna Washington for the purpose of harassing her, berating her for her racist comments, and demanding that she return Epic Beard Man's bag (which she is seen taking after Bruso exited the bus.)

Note: Know Your Meme simply serves to document this phenomenon as passive observers and not active participants. As such, we will not post Iyanna's "dox" although they are widely available to those who engage in such behavior.

Iyanna Washington's Response

Operation: I AM A MOTHERFUCKER was successful in reaching Iyanna Washington, motivating her to create a response video, seen below.

It is worth noting how she carefully chooses to use the overly formal terms "Caucasian" and "African American" rather than the more common and fully acceptable terms black and white. This is further contrasted by her choice to refer to Mr. Bruso as "pinky" in her original video, and her choice to refer to the black man whom she claims to have no familiarity with as "blood" denoting race-based solidarity.

It should also be noted that many have claimed Iyanna's exclamation of "Say it again, Pinky" was meant not as a racial remark on the color of Thomas Bruso's skin, but simply as a reference to the movie Next Friday, however it is not entirely clear how this reference would fit the context.

In addition to her sudden change to using formal language, Ms. Washington also laments the state of violence in the world. This has been viewed by many as hypocrisy due to her previous support of physical violence evidenced in her original video, recorded under 48 hours prior.

"Amber Lamps"

As has been previously mentioned, one of the ways the black man's pronunciation of the word "ambulance" through his battered and bleeding face has been interpreted is "Amber Lamps." Initially, this inspired many of the meme's participants to create images involved amber-colored lights. But by February 17th, a new trend had emerged in which "Amber Lamps" was treated as the name given to the young woman wearing purple seated nearby. Her casual, unaffected facial expression during the ordeal has inspired a bit of modern mythology detailed throughout the image macros and contents of various forum posts. This activity has led her to become something of an offshoot meme. According to Encyclopedia Dramatica:

She's a pretty cool girl. She lives in the hood and doesn't afraid of anything.

Interview with Epic Beard Man

San Francisco's KRON-4 caught up with Epic Beard Man on February 19th to ask for his recount of what happened.

In the video, EBM claims that the man he fought was wanted for murder, would be going to prison for 10 years for armed robbery, assault and battery, and possession of a knife while on parole.
He also alleges that his money and ID were stolen out of his bag, although the bag itself was returned to him three hours following the incident.

As for EBM's recount of how the incident started, filling in gaps prior to the video, he claims that he had been talking to his white friend Bob, asking to borrow money to get some shoes to wear to his mother's funeral on Wednesday. In the original video, he states that the funeral is on Friday.

EBM then claims that he had been telling Bob that he would have "my boy" shine his shoes. He also says that he would have "my brother" shine his shoes. EMB claims that he was using these terms generally, not meaning to denote a person of any specific race.

I was gettin' real scared when he showed me that knife."

Then he claims that he had been sucker-punched in the jaw-bone three times, which is entirely inaccurate. He also claims to have beat the man "so bad and so pretty" that he was "knocked out for 22 and half minutes."

Michael's Response

As it is clear by the fact that Michael is not in prison, it is apparent that Thomas Bruso's allegations that Michael is a murder and has been put in prison are false.

The Documentary

Inspired by all the public attention and discourse surrounding the enigmatic character of Thomas Bruso, RadicalNow created a short documentary about him; at times endearing, at times reaffirming his tendency to embellish.

PSA for the Homeless

On May 8th, 2011, a video titled "I Am Homeless (Epic Beard Man Update)" was posted to YouTube with Thomas Bruso asking for help, and saying he has been homeless since January, 2011. He claims he was evicted for smoking cigarettes and marijuana, and that he is forced to shoplift food from grocery stores to feed himself. The video was picked up by BuzzFeed^[13], The Daily What^[14], and Reddit.^[15]

Film Adaptation: Badass

On December 19th, 2011, a trailer for the film Bad Ass was uploaded to YouTube, starring Danny Trejo as an Epic Beard Man inspired character. The trailer revealed a scene where Trejo beats a man unconscious in a bus fight while wearing a fanny pack and an "I AM A MOTHER FUCKER" t-shirt.

On December 24th, the trailer was posted to the tech blog Geekosystem^[17] and was subsequently posted to MSNBC Today^[18] 3 days later. On December 28th, Slate^[16] published an article that questioned the trailer's authenticity and pointed out the changes that were made regarding the original viral video's racial undertones.

In Bad Ass, on the other hand, the opening bus incident involves a Mexican-American man protecting an elderly black man from two white skinheads. As he leaves the bus, Bad Ass says, “I told you I didn’t want to fight,” as though he was forced into it, and only did what was necessary. While the essential underlying conflict has been utterly revised, however, the filmmakers have dressed Trejo almost exactly as Bruso was in the Epic Beard Man video (right down to his iconic fanny pack), in an obvious effort to capitalize on the attention the video received, and to appeal to that video’s many fans.

Search Interest

On the 17th, searches for Epic Beard Man quickly overtook searches for AC Transit. Searches for Amber Lamps came in 3rd, followed by Thomas Bruso in 4th. What's most interesting to note here is how strong the increase in searches for AC Transit increased due to the incident.

Over the last six years, searches for AC Transit had been gradually decreasing. It seems that the Epic Beard Man incident has gained more attention than the BART train derailment^[11] of December 09 or the cop who went on trial for killing a man on the BART train in January of 2009.^[12]

External References