Gwen Berry Flops At Olympics As She Fails To Medal – Can’t ‘Represent The Oppressed’

Gwen Berry, the hammer thrower who made headlines back in June when she turned her back during the national anthem at the Olympic trials, completely flopped in the Olympic finals on Tuesday when she failed to bring home a medal.

Berry came in eleventh place out of twelve competitors after she threw a distance of just 71.35 meters, according to The New York Post.

This was a humiliating fail for Berry after she turned her back during the national anthem at the trials and put a T-shirt over her face that read “Activist Athlete.”

“For me, it’s always been something that’s been underlyingly uncomfortable, knowing that I’m rocking this big ‘USA’ across my chest when everything about America is to demean and to keep Black people at the bottom of the totem pole,” she told The Washington Post afterwards. “It has always, always, always been something I have been very uncomfortable with. I’m glad I’m able to say that without being punished or without being misunderstood.”

“I try to compartmentalize it. I try to say, ‘The USA can mean a lot of things.’ I try to give it my own meaning, just to say that I do deserve to represent a country that my people have built uncompensated, have worked for and have survived throughout,” Berry added. “I just have to give myself a different meaning of it, regardless of how uncomfortable I am with what it is sometimes.”

Berry had said that she planned to make another political statement if she were to medal in Tokyo.

“I’ll represent the oppressed people,” Berry said days before she failed to medal. “That’s been my message for the last three years.”