Gwen Berry, the Olympic hammer thrower, demonstrated herself earlier this week to be a temper thrower. Berry, who qualified for her second U.S. Olympic team during the trials, got into a funk when the national anthem was played in her presence. Instead of turning to face the American flag with her hand on her heart, as the first- and second-place finishers did, Berry assumed an attitude, as revealed in the photo above.
Naturally, her behavior generated some backlash, which she responded to in an interview with the Black News Channel. In the exchange, a video of which follows, anchor Jimmy Marlow asked her, “What is it about the national anthem or that whole scenario that made you feel so uncomfortable? Why didn’t you want to, you know, acknowledge that part?”
Berry responded:
Will this presidential election be the most important in American history?
History. If you know your history you’d know the full song of the national anthem. The third paragraph speaks to slaves in America — our blood being slain [sic] and — and [indecipherable] all over the floor. It’s disrespectful and it does not speak for black Americans. It’s obvious, there’s no — there’s no question.
If you know your history you’d know it’s obvious? It’s a safe bet that Gwen Berry would have no clue what was contained in the third stanza of the lyrics if some obsessed wokist hadn’t dug it out of obscurity to win a bar bet. The only verse of the anthem that’s ever sung — or known to most Americans — is the first. In addition, doubts have been raised that the pro-slavery interpretation the Left has ascribed to the words is based on a misunderstanding of the poem’s intent.
But there’s more to Berry’s personal history that’s not quite so obvious. As the Daily Mail notes, an old photo of Berry “posted to her website in June 2015 – beaming as she holds aloft the flag.”
The website has since been taken down, which only adds to suspicions that her protest was only skin deep. Typical of the response was a sarcastic tweet by Donald Trump, Jr. that read:
Totally not all an act! She was definitely not protesting to get attention for herself and/or maybe some of those woke Nike sponsorship dollars. 100% legit and not at all a cottage industry victimization scheme we see so much of these days. https://t.co/OSjnPDCKTe
— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) June 30, 2021
