When asked by Don Lemon on Thursday if she'll engage in any protests while competing in Tokyo, Olympic activist Gwen Berry played coy. She kept mentioning "we'll see," and initially said she wouldn't answer. But she ultimately expanded on her answer. "We'll see. You know, it just depends. It depends. You know, everything is a spur of the moment. It depends on how I'm feeling and depends on what I want to do in that moment and what I want to do for my people in that moment. And I will do whatever comes upon me and whatever is in my heart," she ultimately said. That was Thursday, when, as the CNN hosted mentioned, the International Olympic Committee had a ban on such protests and demonstrations. On Friday, though, reports came out that that had changed.
U.S hammer thrower and Olympian Gwen Berry is responding to criticism over turning away from the flag while on the podium at the Olympic trials.
— Don Lemon Tonight (@DonLemonTonight) July 2, 2021
Berry tells @donlemon she was exercising her constitutional right. Watch: pic.twitter.com/yFISNt3zjj
"Olympics Allows Protests, but Not During Events or on Medals Stand," Andrew Keh reported for The New York Times.
As Keh wrote:
Under the new rules, athletes competing this month at the Summer Games in Tokyo now will theoretically be allowed to wear an article of clothing (a shirt with a slogan or a glove, for example) or make a symbolic gesture (like kneeling or raising a fist) to express their views on an issue before the start of their events.
They still will not be allowed to conduct any sort of demonstration on the field of play, on the podium during medal ceremonies, in the Olympic athletes’ village or at the opening and closing ceremonies of the Games.
It was a small but symbolically significant concession, softening the I.O.C.’s longstanding rule against protest at the Games, but it fell short of what many athletes, including many from the United States, had called for in recent months.
Berry, as Landon reported last week, began acting out when the Star-Spangled Banner started playing while she was still on the podium after placing third in the Olympic trials for hammer throw. She claimed that the anthem being played was "a set up."
The activist has gained much attention since then for such a move. Ben Shapiro has weighed in via a column for Townhall. Members of Congress are also speaking out against Berry competing, as Reagan reported, including Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) and Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR).
While Berry did call America "the greatest country in the world," twice, she also doubled down on her protest during her segment on "Don Lemon Tonight."
"Let's be clear. I do respect the Constitution, because obviously I was exercising my constitutional right, but I will not stand for any type of symbol or song that does not stand for all people in America," she said.
Berry also pushed back about the issue having to do with the flag. "We need to be talking about the racial and social injustice issues that still face -- that Black communities still face to this day. It's the same thing. And people are trying to divert the attention to a song and a flag when that's not even the biggest thing that we need to be focusing on right now," she said at another point of her segment.
Perhaps "people are trying to divert the attention to a song and a flag" when Berry threw a fit over this so-called "set up," because it was an act of disrespect against "a song and a flag" which happen to be the National anthem and the American flag.
There was more news to come out about Berry on Friday, though.
Natalie Winters with The National Pulse reported on tweets dating from 2011 to 2012, in which Berry, who just turned 32 on June 29, made the following offensive comments:
The National Pulse can now reveal several posts from Berry’s Twitter account containing racist comments against at odds with the issues she purports to combat.
“This lil white boy being bad as hell!! I would smack his ass then stomp him!! Smh #whitepplKids hella disrespectful,” she tweeted in 2011. Berry has also asserted that “white ppl” run their “damn mouths too much” and are “sooo retarded when they are drunk” among other unkind generalizations about the race:
In addition to anti-white posts, Berry has also made posts with negative references to Chinese people and “Mexicans”:
Berry has also tweeted a “shoutout” to all the “female that’s gon get drunk, get recked by 4 dudes, then cry rape this weekend” and that she was “about to rape” her lunch:
"Just saw this gurl wearing heels with white socks!! What the Hell..#chineseppl always try to start new trends..smh..ggguuurrrllll," was the tweet about Chinese people. "Mexicans just don’t care about ppl," was another tweet.
Is that the best THEY could come up with? I’ll just say I can relate to the Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the USA Brett Kavanaugh and agree, there’s a lot of shitt I don’t do like I did when I was 18 or 20. https://t.co/D2BVHtGlZ9
— Gwen Berry OLY (@MzBerryThrows) July 3, 2021
Berry responded by comparing herself to Justice Brett Kavanaugh.
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