The U.S. hammer thrower who did not cover her heart with her hand and face the American flag when the national anthem was playing as she stood on the third-place podium responded to critics who said she shouldn’t be representing the country.
During the anthem at Saturday’s Olympic qualifier in Oregon, first-place finisher DeAnna Price and second-place finisher Brooke Anderson stood with their hands over their hearts while facing the flag. Berry, however, shifted to face the crowd, held her ceremonial flowers by her side, and eventually held up and then covered her head with a T-shirt that read “Activist Athlete.”
“I never said that I didn’t want to go to the Olympic games. That’s why I competed and got third and made the team. I never said I hated the country. Never said that. All I said was I respect my people enough to not stand or acknowledge something that disrespects them,” Gwen Berry, 31, said Monday in response to a question about those who don’t believe she should participate in the Olympics.
Berry has said she believes the playing of the anthem at that moment was a “setup” done “on purpose” because she claimed she was told it would be played before or after they stood on the podium instead of while they were up there.
She reiterated this during a Monday interview, though USA Track & Field spokeswoman Susan Hazzard has denied the claim.
“History” is the reason she feels uncomfortable with the national anthem, she said.
“If you know your history, you know the full song of the national anthem, the third paragraphs speaks to slaves in America, our blood being slain and piltered all over the floor,” she said. “It’s disrespectful, and it does not speak for black Americans. It’s obvious. There’s no question.”
Berry, who has protested during the anthem previously, referenced the third verse in the extended version of “The Star-Spangled Banner”: “No refuge could save the hireling and slave / From the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave.”
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER
Historians disagree on whether the line is racist, though its writer, Francis Scott Key, favored slavery, and historians believe the reference was to the Colonial Marines, a mostly black unit. About 6,000 black people fled to the British during the War of 1812 on the promise of freedom.
The song is “disrespectful, and it does not speak for black Americans. It’s obvious. There’s no question,” Berry added.
