North Korea Defector Says Gwen Berry Would Have Been Executed Over Flag Protest

Team USA hammer thrower Gwen Berry infamously turned her back on the national anthem earlier this week as part of her “activist athlete” persona. In what has become commonplace in the freest country in world history, Berry’s actions underscore a growing unwillingness to embrace the blessings of America, and instead to try and paint it as evil or unjust.

Such moronic displays of ignorance would be akin to lashing out at a buffet for offering an option that you don’t like; just don’t put it on your plate if you really believe it is terrible. There are still plenty of delicious options to appreciate and taste.

These leftist narratives, rooted in propagandized discontent and implemented as precursors to communism, claim to value the broad spectrum of American life, but actually destabilize the democracy they claim to care so much about. They would rather shut down the buffet altogether and form a bread line, as totalitarianism is the only way in which humans can achieve perfect equity.

Activists like Berry rely upon sweeping generalizations of “oppression” and “privilege” that have been instilled in them by generations past, but they fail to understand just how much real oppression exists outside of our borders -- and will one day exist inside our borders, if the slow march away from American values continues.

Why is it that the very thing the left claims to hate is the very thing that they are fomenting? Simple: subversion and manipulation at the top, and brainwashed, angry minions throughout the ranks. If you truly believe that you are being oppressed, then your life will feel like an oppression—which is why the Democrat Party tells their own voters incessantly how miserable they should feel.

The ploys are so obvious to anyone standing outside the liberal culture machine: community is allegedly their goal, but family values are squelched at every turn. As a result, reports of loneliness spike in urban, blue cities where people feel inundated with options but devoid of much loving, authentic human connection.

Government-mandated community therefore becomes an admirable goal to those feeling isolated and left behind by life, even though every opportunity for contentment exists in this great country. When thoughts of oppression are your god, then you are truly oppressed, indeed.

But another type of oppression also exists, one so gruesome that it completely obliterates any plausible notion of discontent that anti-American radicals may harbor. Yeonmi Park, a legitimate human rights activist and defector from North Korea, recently said of Berry’s stunt: "If she did the exact same thing at this very moment, if she was North Korean, not only herself will be executed, eight generations of her family can be sent to political prison camp and execution.”

Holy hell, eight generations. In other words, if you don’t like what Kim Jong-Un is cooking up in the buffet, he will just eliminate your entire lineage. Park, who was a legitimate 21st century slave, went on to make another excellent point: some people in this world are so truly oppressed, so subjugated by power structures aimed at neutering their spirit, that they don’t even realize that they are oppressed. Like prisoners chained to the cave in Plato’s allegory, no other version of reality even registers in their minds as a possibility.

And that’s how true totalitarianism flourishes: it may end with a loaded gun pointed at your head, but it starts as a complete departure from reality. America has serious blemishes in its past, as does every iteration of human civilization, but the reality of this country aligns perfectly with the reality of the human experience altogether: your life is what you make it. Gwen Berry is making a life of frustration and infamy. Yeonmi Park is making a life of appreciation and purpose. I know which horse I’m betting on to have the more impactful, fulfilling life.

Happy Fourth of July, OutKick family. Thank you for welcoming me so warmly to the site, and I sincerely hope you enjoy your holiday weekend celebrating the incredible lives we all get to live in this great nation. Now do your civic duty and go find a massive buffet somewhere.