That's the debate roiling social media the morning after the Kansas City Chiefs beat the San Francisco 49ers in Super Bowl LIV. It was a great game, a fantastic comeback engineered by the Chiefs' young quarterback Patrick Mahomes.
Tuesday, February 04, 2020
Super Bowl halftime show: A parental warning for JLo, Shakira?
That's the debate roiling social media the morning after the Kansas City Chiefs beat the San Francisco 49ers in Super Bowl LIV. It was a great game, a fantastic comeback engineered by the Chiefs' young quarterback Patrick Mahomes.
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Real talk: why is football even marketed as family entertainment? Just as easily as you could argue that JLo and Shakira's performance is destructive for children to view, you could argue that watching football is destructive for children. With the injuries it causes, the acts of aggression it supports, and the history it has for ignoring domestic abuse, football has just as much of an ability to be destructive. I am not necessarily arguing against content warnings for the half-time show, especially because most TV programs provide one. I just think that parents should be a little less concerned with the content their kids consume and more concerned with how their children process and react to it. Shakira's "Hips Don't Lie" was my favorite song when I was 8. I likely watched content very similar to this weekend's half-time show growing up. It did not have a negative impact on me because of how my parents raised me. Sheltering your children has been proven to be ineffective and actively counterproductive. Instead, allowing them to experience the world as everyone else does, but providing them with the context and takeaways you deem appropriate will be the most effective for them to be able to navigate the world in the future. You only get to control what your child sees for maybe 5 years of their life. You should give them the proper tools/morals/etc to process everything they will see after that.
The Super Bowl is one of America's biggest sports games that is watched on national television every year. Some people watch it for the game, others for the commercials, and still others for the half time show. But usually, the big game is to invite friends over for nachos and wings and talk amongst each other with the game on as background noise. To me, that's what football games are always about. The social interactions with others. In high school, we didn't go to watch the game, we went to see our friends, take cute photos of us in matching colored shirts, and then call it a night. Football may be marketed as family entertainment, but it is really more the reason everyone gathers, not the main event. That being said, this years half time show caught my attention more than others in previous years. Mainly because, in my opinion, it was actually good. The songs were fun, the lights were crazy, the dancers were insane, and the singers actually sang. Pretty well too. Also, it was two female singers who danced incredibly well. Yes, their dancing was a bit suggestive, but its Shakira and JLo. Their dancing is always suggestive. It is a part of their act. Also, it is not like FOX didn't advertise who was doing the halftime show. They flaunted it regularly during the game. If parents did not want their children to see it, they could have just changed the channel.
I watched the halftime show and there wasn't a single moment during it when I thought, woah, this is was too provocative or "too sexy," or even acknowledged the provocative nature of it. Granted, I spent most of it looking out for a friend of mines who was performing with Shakira and just being so proud, but I didn't receive the performance in the way that others did. It wasn't until I got on the internet and saw people's reactions that I realized all of this. I'm a little surprised by the angle the attention surrounding this performance is coming from. I mean, I get that it was the super bowl and there may have been a different set of expectations in terms of the performances, but it's Shakira... and Jlo... in Miami. I hate to be that person, but what else was expected here? Maybe I can only say that because I live in Miami and I have spent the past few years living in a heavily Latin-inspired culture, but this performance was not a shocker to me, and I personally did not think that it was too inappropriate. But this is all based on my opinion and my tastes. With that being said, it was a stellar performance and I loved and appreciated all of the Latin vibes. It was very Miami. They did a a good job of representing the feel of Miami on that stage and showcasing their culture. I understand that it may have been too much for some audiences, but Miami always brings the heat. When in Rome...
This article is aggravating to me. I know that it’s an opinion article but the author goes back and forth on their opinion that it makes it hard to hear a conclusive thought. Personally, I don’t think that the Super Bowl, or any football game for a matter or fact, should be labeled as “family friendly”. The sport is inherently dangerous and violent, as is hockey and many other sports. Aside from the game, the halftime show is always a cultural experience. As mentioned in the article, knowing who the performers are and their style of performance, some butts are gonna be shaking. The article also mentioned that they could have provided a content warning, but I don’t think it’s necessary. There was no harsh language or anything explicitly sexual. Current culture has turned everything sexual, but even what is regarded as a stripper pole is not inherently sexual. I think that parents should have more common sense than to let their children watch an aggressive game featuring a live performance that could be seen as inappropriate. Also if parents let their kids watch it and they were upset by the performance, they also should think about what else theri kids are watching, because there are a lot worse things out in the world than what was shown at the Super Bowl.
Honestly, this is ridiculous. And yes, it is a hill that I will if not die on, then at least come away pretty bloodied from. The notion that two women who are fairly well covered (the mesh on JLo’s bodysuit was definitely not illusion - you could see a tonal difference) who are dancing mildly provocatively (as they do in many of their respective performances and not in any way that you would not see in your run of the mill club). In our society where you can see depictions of sex (much closer to the “softcore porn” that the article references than the dancing at this year’s Super Bowl) on regular cable TV or turn on your handy dandy pocket computer and Google that same phrase to immediate results, there honestly is not any justification for the hate these women are getting. I don’t often watch football, but when I do I am much more concerned about when players get injured than I am watching the footage from this year’s halftime show. FOX practically plastered notice of the halftime performers everywhere; if you do not want your children watching them, make that decision ahead of time as you were given notice and could probably guess the nature of the performance.
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