Who represents you, Gwen Berry or Tamyra Mensah-Stock?

[Dashinka 24,731]

I saw Tamyra Mensah-Stock in her gold medal match, and she was great.  She is an amazing woman who has been through a lot and comes through on top.  I definitely choose her.

 

Who represents you, Gwen Berry or Tamyra Mensah-Stock?

 

Few contrasts are greater than the one presented by two black American athletes who recently made news as much for their politics and demeanor as for their sports achievements.

Wrestler Tamyra Mensah-Stock won Olympic gold on Tuesday and responded not just with charming joy but also with an uplifting display of love and respect for her country. With the star-spangled banner wrapped around her muscular shoulders, she thanked God and said, “I love representing the USA. I love living there. I love it. I am so happy I get to represent USA.”

 

This was not the reaction we heard in late June from Gwen Berry, a hammer thrower who expressed anything but patriotic pride after securing a place on the U.S. Olympic team. She stood on the medals podium, turned away from the American flag, and stared into the cameras with a sulky expression on her face. She brandished a T-shirt with a political protest logo on it, put it over her head, and generally made a sour spectacle of herself.

 

Later, she explained to Time magazine that she does not “respect something that doesn’t stand for all people” and went on to say “blacks … are not treated as human beings” by the “elite or the white supreme.” She rejected the idea that her action was the opposite of representing America because “stating my rights” is “extremely American.”

 

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/who-represents-you-gwen-berry-or-tamyra-mensah-stock

[yuna628 9,700]

So here is a weird idea, why do they have to represent me or you at all? Why can't they just be athletes competing and doing their best win or lose? If they are to represent America, well then I'd say they both are doing a fine job... because America, and Americans are not a one size fits all mold that is rubber stamped in patriotism and a certain religion. It is a place where a person has the right to feel a variety of ways about a subject even when they may be wrong, where they are not forced to be patriotic, where they can believe in whatever political ideology or religion they want. They are free to be proud or ashamed or nothing at all. At any given moment there are millions of different voices speaking that may be the same or very very different from your own. That is the essence of America.

[Dashinka 24,731]

Then let's do away with participating in global sporting events as a country.  Sounds good to me.  Btw, if Gwen Berry is offended by the US, she has that right, just as I have the right to be offended by her.

Edited August 5, 2021 by Dashinka

[LIBrty4all 3,754]

Gwen Berry is a traitor to her country, and as such, should be banished from representing the USA in the olympics.  If she were Chinese, she would have been shot by now.  Shame on her.

[yuna628 9,700]

6 hours ago, Dashinka said:

Then let's do away with participating in global sporting events as a country.  Sounds good to me.  Btw, if Gwen Berry is offended by the US, she has that right, just as I have the right to be offended by her.

Not saying you don't either, I'm simply saying that to be an American, it's often representative of very different people with varying degrees of viewpoints that might not make sense to you or me nor do they have to. I'm not into the whole forced patriotism thing, they're athletes, and they seem to have done their job.

[LIBrty4all 3,754]

17 minutes ago, yuna628 said:

Not saying you don't either, I'm simply saying that to be an American, it's often representative of very different people with varying degrees of viewpoints that might not make sense to you or me nor do they have to. I'm not into the whole forced patriotism thing, they're athletes, and they seem to have done their job.

Typically, it's most often people born in America who seem to hate the country so much.  A few, like Talib, are transplants.  But very few, on average.

[Dashinka 24,731]

9 hours ago, LIBrty4all said:

Typically, it's most often people born in America who seem to hate the country so much.  A few, like Talib, are transplants.  But very few, on average.

That is one big difference between Mensah-Stock, and Berry, one is from a family that relatively recently immigrated to the US and the other from a family that has been here a lot longer with a lot more exposure to the race-baiting grifters and their ilk.

[Dashinka 24,731]

9 hours ago, yuna628 said:

Not saying you don't either, I'm simply saying that to be an American, it's often representative of very different people with varying degrees of viewpoints that might not make sense to you or me nor do they have to. I'm not into the whole forced patriotism thing, they're athletes, and they seem to have done their job.

America is all about a widely diverse collection of people, I don't think anyone is arguing that.  There are people of all types with all kinds of thoughts, but representing your country in an event that is supposed to be free from politics is a different matter.  It is their individual choice to do what they want within or outside the rules laid out to them, just don't expect everyone to agree with them.  It has nothing to do with forced patriotism, just as American's have the choice to root against our "representative" national team when one disagrees with their collective or at least displayed political activism.