During the 2015 Ben & Jerry’s Global Franchise Meeting this weekend, co-founder Ben Cohen launched into a fiery speech on the recent spate of police shootings of unarmed African-American men. In it, he encouraged independent branches to sell “hands up, don’t shoot” T-shirts at their shops across the country. Cohen noted: “Some people might say, ‘We can’t sell shirts like that in our shop. It’s controversial.’ But isn’t that exactly the point? If it weren’t controversial, we wouldn’t need to do it.”

Cohen’s statement comes at 4:30 in the video below.

Uploaded By: Stamp Stampede

Just few days ago, a Facebook picture of Cohen wearing a T-shirt with the phrase “hands up, don’t shoot” sparked an angry social media response. Outraged users called for a boycott of Cohen’s namesake ice cream.

#benandjerrys Fuck Ben and Jerry's for making it clear they're anti-police…first supporting a convicted cop killer pic.twitter.com/zEpowI1JjY — Michael M. (@MJJMerritt) January 19, 2015

Though Cohen remains on the advisory board of the company, he has not been involved in its day-to-day operations since Unilever acquired Ben & Jerry’s in 2000.