Aside from Kansas City’s comeback win over the San Francisco during Super Bowl LIV Sunday night, much of the talk was about the halftime show featuring Shakira and Jennifer Lopez.
The show itself, given the setting in Miami and the two Hispanic artists, was heavy with various cultural aspects and quite frankly a breath of fresh air all things considered. Likewise, a standout moment during the performance came when J-Lo’s daughter joined her Mom on stage to sing “Born in the USA” with a Puerto Rican flag draped in the background.
And aside from right-conservative reactionaries being triggered because of the Halftime Show not having enough English and the Karen’s of the World wondering if anyone would “please think of the children” given Shakira and J-Lo’s outfits… Despite of course creaming their pants when Adam Levine was half-naken onstage, the performance was generally met with positive reviews.
Then there’s the NFL aspect.
I’m sure there’s plenty of people out there who are willing to give the NFL props for helping orchestrate such a culturally impactful show while airing it FOX which has more or less become state television for Donald Trump and his divisive rhetoric, especially against Hispanic people.
And although Shakira and J-Lo should get plenty of praise for their performances, the NFL has a LONG way to go when it comes to repairing their image when it comes to social and cultural awareness.
Namely, let’s not forget this is the same League that completely blackballed Colin Kaepernick for standing up for racial and social injustices to the point where the majority of white owners actively colluded against him. Meanwhile, Roger Goodell and the League totally caved to pressure from Donald Trump and his racially charged rhetoric that included referring to black athletes as “sons of bitches” for showing solidarity with Kapernick in his kneel down for social justice. Not to mention, it was also the NFL caving into this faux patriotism that was being spewed out of the White House that somehow black players kneeling during the National Anthem were anti-American, despite the basis of their actions being very stated.
And all of this isn’t even getting into the fact that the League has a very real problem when it comes to hiring minority coaches or general managers. Out of the 32 teams, there’s a total of three black coaches and one minority general manager. Put this into the context of the myriad of white billionaire owners and it’s not hard to connect the dots to the systematic problems still very real within the NFL.
So no, the NFL doesn’t get credit for shit. If they want to make any real progress when it comes to social and cultural awareness, do it during a set of circumstances that don’t have sponsors and money attached to it. They can start by giving Colin Kaepernick a fair shake.
