One of the two main characters grabs another man by the testicles, and then releases his grip, and the other man falls to the floor. The man subjected to this whimpers in pain. Give or take, this scene goes on for a minute.
A man, an FBI agent, threatens to castrate another man, the mayor of the city, if he doesn't divulge who is responsible for the murders of three civil rights workers. During the run-up to this, the man issuing the threat graphically recounts the story of a young black boy who was castrated by some racist thugs. This scene is very unsettling and is not for the faint of heart.
This movie is very racially charged. There are lots of beatings administered by both white and black people. A person is shot in the head at close-quaters. (offscreen) Black people are hung, we see the nooses go around their necks and they are then lifted up by white people.
A child is kicked in the face by a member of the Ku Klux Klan.
A car drives through a busy part of town and throws out a black teenager who has clearly been beaten by the men in the car.
A reference is made to a teenager being abducted by the KKK and taken to a remote location where his scrotum was removed using a razor, and that his body looked as though it had been dipped in blood from the waist down.
One of the protagonists attacks one of the leaders of the gang in a barber shop, cutting open his cheek with a razor and beating him, which leaves him weak and moaning in a chair.