NFL sends radically mixed message with Super Bowl 2021 halftime show
The NFL season ends Sunday, and I suspect it will end the same way it began: with reminders that we’re all racists who need to change our ways. No specifics will be given. None are ever given.
And having not oppressed a minority since breakfast — hell, I’ve been a virtual shut-in since March — I’m sick of it.
It’s all part of the radically mixed, highly selective social and racial messages that have been delivered with the cowardly, pandering certification and capitulation of Roger “The PSL Salesman” Goodell and a chosen blindness to what most continues to afflict black America.
Scheduled to perform at Sunday’s Super Bowl halftime is the popular black entertainer who calls himself The Weeknd. It’s unlikely he’ll perform this one — though you never know — but here are the lyrics from one of his numbers, titled “Ebony.” Apparently it’s a love song. I’ve added the edits:
“I think I’ve finally fell in love now
Her name is Tammy, she got hella bitches
She let me f–k ’em while my n—-s film it …
Man, I love my baby, man, I love my baby
Trust me, trust me, I love my baby
Man, I love my baby, man, I love my baby, trust me, trust me. …
Girl go ’head and show me how you go down
And I feel my whole body peakin’
And I’m f—in’ anybody with they legs wide
Got me higher than a n—a from the West Side
East coast n—a reppin’ North Side, never waste a ho’s time
Bitch, I’m on my own time, f–k a n—a co-sign
’Cause I get it better like proline, baby girl, I don’t lie
Used to have no money for a crib
Now my room service bill cost your whole life
N—a try to me step me, I go all-out military
I’m camo’d all-out like I’m in the military
Free my n—a Jack, wish he was out in February
Perfect time to come out for the album drop
But this s–t a throwaway”
It’s worth noting that a few weeks ago when CBS’ James Brown, a black man who often decries racial discrimination, announced on CBS’ NFL pregame that The Weeknd would headline this Super Bowl, he said he was delighted by this news — as was CBS, the NFL, and NFL Talent and Justice Coordinator Jay-Z. Pepsi is the halftime sponsor and enabler.
The Weeknd has a few clean songs, but many are aimed at those born to satisfy his immediate sexual lust, including a number in which he repeats, “who’s gonna f- -k you like me?” plus other more N-worded odes.
But James Brown claims to be delighted by the choice of The Weeknd, and it carries the NFL’s stamp of approval — as if Brown and Goodell would demonstrate the courage of their conviction by publicly repeating such lyrics.
And in our world gone nuts, to protest the use of the N-word is to risk condemnation as a tone-deaf racist who doesn’t understand the context— as if there’s a good one, as if the martyred Martin Luther King Jr. also just didn’t get it.
It remains to be seen if this year’s Super Bowl halftime family entertainment will be an improvement over recent go-low extravaganzas. In 2019, the halftime show included stars who were N-wording, women-degrading, crotch-grabbing rappers. Last year Jennifer Lopez’s classless, pole dancing strip-joint revue made its intended beyond-football splash.
Goodell and the NFL gave it their usual, selective silence.
But remember: Fight sexism! Fight racism!
Handful of schools conquer politics and NFL
For this year’s Super Bowl Quiz, we call upon reader Hank Ratner, who challenges us to name the five colleges that have produced a U.S. president and a winning Super Bowl quarterback.
The answers will be in next month’s congressional record. Nah, the answers will be where they’ve been, since Gutenberg first cranked his press: below.
Promo Code Evan: True or False? A gambling line has been established for total number of players to miss this Super Bowl due to COVID-19 restrictions. Too ghoulish to be true. Ah, but it’s true. It’s 1.5.
False, but only thus far: Over/Under is 3 on how many times CBS will needlessly cut to sideline reporters.
Over/Under on times running backs and receivers will signal first down to emphasize that they, and no one else, had the ball: 3.
Number of times Jim Nantz or Tony Romo will say “moves the chains” rather than first down: 2.5.
Quiz Answers:
Joe Biden, Ravens’ Joe Flacco; Delaware. Benjamin Harrison, Steelers’ Ben Roethlisberger; Miami of Ohio. Gerald Ford, Patriots’ Tom Brady; Michigan. Jimmy Carter, Cowboys’ Roger Staubach; Navy. Herbert Hoover, Raiders’ Jim Plunkett and Broncos’ John Elway; Stanford.
Outdated tough talk by coaches
Reader Bill Moniz: “Watching the recent immature, semi-coherent ramblings of new NFL head coaching hires … Dan Campbell (Lions) and Nick Siriani (Eagles) make Joe Judge seem a combination of Winston Churchill and Vince Lombardi.”
According to impeachable sources, a touchdown in Sunday’s Puppy Bowl will conclude with a beagle flagged for performing a genuine Odell Beckham Jr. in the end zone.
How does an NFL QB know when he has made it big? Well, when you type “Roethlisberger,” the computer no longer adds that red underline to alert spell-check.
My curb-feelers tell me that Sunday’s game will in large part be determined by at least one extra-long gain after the defender tried to devastate the ball carrier rather than simply tackle him.
Other than that both retired last week,after terrific careers, what do Daniel Murphy and Dustin Pedroia have in common? A: Early in their careers both were fully and expertly dismissed by Mike Francesa as totally bereft of MLB talent.
Happy 90th Larry Merchant, former Post sports columnist and later the plain truth-telling, HBO boxing commentator and former undersized third-string Oklahoma running back from Brooklyn.
Reader Louis Motola admits to taking an NBA “load management” day. “I walked behind a snow plow.”