Good lord, right-wingers, get a grip. It’s unhealthy to expend this a lot power being unhappy a couple of Tremendous Bowl halftime performer.
Sure, they’re nonetheless freaking out about Unhealthy Bunny. A lot in order that they’ve carried out essentially the most hilariously impotent lib-coded factor possible: created a Change.org petition.
“The Tremendous Bowl halftime present ought to unite our nation, honor American tradition, and stay family-friendly, not be changed into a political stunt. Unhealthy Bunny represents none of those values; his drag performances and elegance are the other of what households count on on soccer’s greatest stage,” the petition reads.
Have any of those folks seen a Tremendous Bowl halftime present within the final 25 years? We’ve had the likes of Kendrick Lamar, Usher, Rihanna, Girl Gaga, Shakira, Beyoncé, and Prince. In reality, it’s a must to return to 2003 to discover a nation artist, and that was Shania Twain, who has at the very least dabbled in pop music.
You’ll notice that conservatives should not suggesting that Twain return—as a result of she loves drag and nonbinary and trans artists.
The anger over the Puerto Rican rapper is absolutely simply straight-up racism thinly—very thinly—disguised as some imprecise craving for America’s misplaced glory. However actually, the suitable is simply livid that it might need to listen to Spanish songs. And the way dare conservatives be pressured to look at a overseas performer—oh, wait … they preserve forgetting that Puerto Rico is a U.S. territory.
And the signers of this petition actually don’t have any qualms in any respect about posting essentially the most bigoted feedback.
“The Tremendous Bowl used to really feel like America — robust, grounded, united. Now it seems like we’re forgetting the individuals who constructed that unity with their naked fingers. This isn’t about music. It’s about reminiscence. A few nation that when stood tall, proud, and grateful — and the concern that we would not anymore,” one remark mentioned.
“The individuals who constructed that unity with their naked fingers”? What does that even imply?
One other signer wrote, “American sports activities converse the language we perceive.”
Okay, that one is each racist and incoherent.
Or how about, “Most People converse English… no race hate supposed but it surely’s the reality. I don’t even actually know who he’s. Deliver nation music again to soccer! Cease listening to Jay z all of the dang time.”
You already know that any time you see a qualifier like “no race hate supposed,” what follows is assured to be racist as fuck.
“George Strait is a significantly better selection than that factor that has no thought if he desires to be a man or a chick,” another person wrote.
Certain, let’s throw some homophobia into the combination!
The one purpose conservatives are fixated on Strait particularly is that President Donald Trump named him a Kennedy Heart honoree earlier this yr. There isn’t some natural groundswell of demand occurring right here.
Additionally, it’s simply embarrassing to stack up Strait’s numbers towards Unhealthy Bunny. In 2024, Unhealthy Bunny’s songs have been streamed 11.5 billion occasions. He was additionally essentially the most performed artist on Spotify from 2020 to 2022, and he’s the No. 1 Latin artist on Billboard’s recap of the final 25 years. And his newest album, “DeBÍ TiRAR MáS FOToS,” hit No. 1 earlier this yr.
To be truthful, the 73-year-old Strait does have a best hits album nonetheless kicking across the Billboard 200 … at quantity 119.
In the meantime, Home Speaker Mike Johnson, positively a person with a eager grasp of recent tradition, thinks Lee Greenwood ought to play the Tremendous Bowl. Sure, the person who has actually just one track everybody is aware of, “God Bless the USA,” which got here out in 1984. The dude is 82 years previous—nobody is clamoring for Greenwood.
However there’s one thing else occurring right here in addition to simply the abject racism. Conservatives are incensed that they’ll’t seize the tradition. They management all three branches of presidency they usually’re terrorizing the nation, however they nonetheless can’t power us to hearken to no matter fifth-rate has-been who’s connected themselves to Trump.
The NFL isn’t going to eliminate Unhealthy Bunny, particularly not due to a petition that’s earned a paltry 30,000 signatures.
As a level of comparability that will surely infuriate the signers of this petition, the Justice for George Floyd petition obtained 19 million signatures, a petition to designate the KKK a terrorist group obtained greater than 3 million, and a petition to cancel scholar debt obtained 800,000. Hell, even a petition to make actor LeVar Burton the host of “Jeopardy” netted 296,000 signatures.
Conservatives should content material themselves with the Turning Level USA alternate halftime present, which now has an internet site however no performers. Lara Trump has stepped ahead and supplied to carry out, regardless of actually by no means being requested. She’s positive to be an enormous draw, what together with her most up-to-date single getting about 2,800 streams on Spotify.
If fortune smiles on us, maybe Turning Level will get Creed to headline, as they’ve threatened. Then we might hope for a repeat of his 2001 halftime present, a actually unhinged expertise full with shirtless males on aerial silks and the worst lip syncing you’ve ever seen.
The thought of Creed because the family-friendly various to Unhealthy Bunny is particularly comical. The band’s lead singer, Scott Stapp … okay, we’re gonna want an inventory right here:
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He began a fistfight with members of the band 311.
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He made a intercourse tape with Child Rock and 4 ladies, for which he needed to sue to stop it from being offered. However it’s okay as a result of, for Christians like Stapp, getting blow jobs from groupies isn’t really intercourse.
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He obtained arrested for public intoxication roughly 24 hours after getting married.
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He was charged with felony home assault, which was later dropped to a misdemeanor.
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He jumped off of a lodge balcony in Miami throughout a drug binge, falling 40 toes and breaking his cranium, hip, and nostril.
Now that’s family-friendly, proper?
In distinction, actually the one filth you’ll be able to dig up on Unhealthy Bunny is that his ex-girlfriend sued him in 2023 for together with a recording of her saying, “Unhealthy Bunny, child,” on two songs, for which she demanded $40 million.
There’s nothing that right-wingers can do to alter the truth that Unhealthy Bunny goes to carry out on the Tremendous Bowl. He’s going to sing in Spanish. He may put on a costume. He may kiss a dude. However it doesn’t matter what he does, he will probably be reflective of the USA—a polyglot nation of immigrants and a wonderful mashup of cultures.
George Strait might by no means.
