That SBLIX Halftime Show
As I mentioned in my previous entry, I watched the Super Bowl with my father and brother. They're both varying degrees of conservative, while my wife and I (and by extension, our son) are all vary degrees of liberal/progressive. We warned our son before the game that he'd likely see Trump on the TV at some point, and that in the interest of not derailing what we hoped would a happy, celebratory night (or, worse, not making a disappointing night even more tense and uncomfortable.)
Everything was fine. Trump was a doofus and saluted instead of crossing his heart during the national anthem, Taylor Swift got booed because she's a filthy traitor to her Eagles fandom, and everyone had a good chuckle about the game it's pageantry (and all thoroughly enjoying the pregame music, because, dammit, it was just goooooood.)
And then Kendrick Lamar came on.
Full disclosure, I am not a rap or hip-hop enthusiast. I never have been, and I highly doubt I ever will be. But I can still recognize when someone has talent and a message, and Lamar sure as shit has that stuff in spades. I can also recognize when something is not intended for my enjoyment, and that Halftime performance was definitely not for me. I'm not in the target demo of Lamar fans or hip-hop fans, nor am I privy to the inside messages and symbolism being intended for members of the Culture (a term I use in all due respect, I can acknowledge that I'm not part of something while still understanding it's value and importance.) I'm a dopey, middle-aged white dude from suburban/rural Pennsylvania. Lamar wasn't speaking for me during his performance.
So there we all were. We had some conversation about who the performance was for – I said it was clearly for people younger than us. Lamar is huge, whether we 5 white people in a comfortable suburban living room understand that or not. My brother, to his credit, looked Lamar up on Spotify and practically blew a gasket at his monthly stream numbers, having to accept that he might just be out of touch a bit. My dad, to his credit, accepted that as a nearly 70 year old white man, maybe the days of Paul McCartney and Tom Petty performing at halftime were long gone. Good for them both.
But neither one understood what has happening on the screen in front of them. A black man was telling them that the revolution wouldn't be televised. He was standing in the middle of a fractured American flag. “Uncle Sam” was chastising him for the way he acted, the words he said, the message he was sending. And while I happily accepted that I wasn't going to get much personal joy out of the performance, I could see what was plainly in front of me: a giant middle finger to the conservative establishment and the sitting president who was leaving at halftime to fly home over his newly christened Gulf of America. So, while I don't think my father and brother “got it,” I do think they both came to a realization that lots of people did, and if they don't want to understand that message, they were doing it at their own detriment.