Twisted Tea Viral Video Shines Spotlight on GoFundMe for Man’s Son

The man who hit a racist with a can of Twisted Tea in a recent viral video is finding help for his family through crowdfunding on social media. Barry Allen has come forward to confirm he is the man with the can in the recent viral video, and he is asking for help to handle his son’s urgent medical bills. From the looks of it, Allen’s GoFundMe campaign has seen a significant influx of donations since he gained Internet fame.

After the video of his fight in an Elyria, Ohio Circle K convenience store went viral, Allen appeared on the Mark One Sports podcast to tell his side of the story. Allen revealed that his 6-year-old son, Silas, has a whole host of medical issues stemming from a kmt2b gene mutation. The family has had a GoFundMe page active since March of 2019, but the Twisted Tea video seems to have spurred a wave of new donations.

“Silas was born 11/20/2013 with malrotation found at four months old,” the fundraiser reads. “Following that after all the years of testing and more then 132 iv pokes, central line changes and surgeries, Silas’ stomach and intestine was pinned to his abdominal wall. Later down the years we were forced to go to nationwide hospital in Columbus where what we thought was the end of our journey was just the beginning.”

The fundraiser details all of Silas’ medical struggles, and notes that he is one of five children in the family — and that two of his siblings have disabilities as well. It also reveals that Allen was fired from his job recently because of the amount of time he needs to take off to care for his children. Years of surgery have taken Silas as far as Boston for specialists’ attention, but to no avail.

The family is hoping the fundraiser will help them by a wheelchair accessible car for Silas and other much-needed medical supplies that are not covered by insurance. The latest update on the fundraiser was posted on Saturday, Jan. 2, reading: “We are beyond thankful. I can’t even put into words what everyone’s donation means to us! Silas wanted to thank everyone.”

The update includes a video of Silas thanking donors from his wheelchair, saying: “Thank you so much, love you!” It was posted on Twitter as well, where users have been spinning memes out of the Twisted Tea fight for over a week now.

At the time of this writing, Silas’ fundraiser has reached $17,677, with more donations coming in by the minute. The campaign has a goal of $20,000, which it might exceed at this point. Supporters have been showering the family with well-wishes non-stop.