Super Bowl 2022
The rapper was the protagonist in the break of the Rams-Bengals for repeating the anti-racist gesture that cost Colin Kaepernick, quarterback of the 49ers, his career in the NFL several years ago
The intermission of the Super Bowl 2022 was a tribute to the hip-hop of the 90s and early 2000s. Six legends of the genre such as Snoop Dogg , Mary J. Blige , Kendrick Lamar, Dr. Dre , 50 Cent and Eminem Appointment on the lawn of the SoFi Stadium in Los Angeles to offer one of the most applauded performances that are remembered in the quintessential game of American sport. A performance, by the way, that was not without controversy.
To begin with, because some of the songs performed went through a previous filter that stripped them of any reference to racial issues or intimate parts of the human anatomy, as happened with Alright , by Kendrick Lamar , one of the most punished and distant songs of its original version, according to the American chronicles.
The song, known for its criticism of police violence against the African-American community, includes a line that says “And we hate po-po” (which can be translated as “And we hate the police”). According to EW , that line could not be heard during the NBC broadcast due to a camera cut that took Lamar out of the shot. Instead, Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg’s could be heard saying “Still not loving police” during their rendition of Still DRE ., their anti-police song.
Beyond this, the biggest controversy came from the hand of Eminem, who nailed his knee to the ground for a minute after performing one of his great classics, Lose Yourself . Nailing the knee to the ground is not just any gesture in the context of the NFL. Especially since 2016, when Colin Kaepernick , quarterback for the San Francisco 49ers and one of the league’s biggest stars, began doing it in protest every time the American anthem was played before games.
The NFL knew in advance the gesture of Eminem
“I’m not going to stand up to show pride in a flag of a country that oppresses blacks and people of color,” said the player, who from that moment on became a symbol for the defense of human rights. of the African-American community, but also an awkward face for the league. So much so that he has been without a team for more than five years despite his efforts to play in the NFL again.
In the days before the match between the Los Angeles Rams and the Cincinnati Bengals, several American media reported that the participants in the game break were prohibited from kneeling on the ground. Eminem, on the other hand, did it, so he would have broken the rules imposed by the organization. However, an NFL representative assures Variety that the league was aware of the Detroit rapper’s intentions.
“We saw all the elements of the show during multiple rehearsals this week and we knew he was going to do that. This was not a cause for concern. A player or coach could have taken a knee and there would have been no problem,” says a spokesman for a league, the NFL, which in recent times has been involved in racial controversies beyond what happened by Kaepernick.
Without going any further, coach Brian Flores sued the NFL and three of his teams -Miami Dolphins, Denver Broncos and New York Giants- just two weeks ago, alleging racial discrimination. Even the president of the United States, Joe Biden , spoke out this weekend about it and asked the league to hire more African-American coaches – right now there are only 4 of 32 teams. “It’s not required by law, but it’s a requirement, I think, of a little bit of generic decency,” the US president told NBC.