Bad Bunny is performing at the Super Bowl. Cry about it.<\/p>\n
The announcement was made Sunday night by Apple Music, the NFL and Roc Nation. As expected, the loudest voices were the negative ones. Even\u00a0Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton called out the choice<\/a>, suggesting Jason Aldean to “bring some patriotism into a country that desperately needs it.”<\/p>\n MORE FROM JOEY GUERRA:<\/strong> These are 11 of Houston’s essential female voices that are helping define the city’s sound<\/a><\/p>\n And by “patriotism” he means white, male and English only.<\/p>\n The irony, of course, is that the very people who constantly bemoan “cancel culture” and poke fun at “snowflakes” for being easily offended are now engaged in the loudest, most visible act of performative outrage, demanding the cancellation of an artist whose success is simply outside of their cultural comfort zone.<\/p>\n Bad Bunny performs on Friday, February 14, 2025 on ‘SNL50: The Homecoming Concert’. (Theo Wargo\/Peacock)<\/p>\n Still, it’s difficult to think of a current performer in any\u00a0language more successful than Bad Bunny. He was the most-streamed artist on Spotify from 2020-2022, the second in 2023 and third in 2024. In Houston, his appeal is\u00a0just as immense, where he’s\u00a0been among the top five most-streamed artists<\/a> for the last several years. He’s earned 15 top 10 singles on the all-genre Billboard Hot 100 chart, an incredible feat for an artist who performs primarily in Spanish. Two of those songs – “I Like It” with Cardi B and J Balvin and “Un x100to” with Grupo Frontera – achieved the kind of cultural dominance that goes beyond music and seeps into every aspect of pop culture.<\/p>\n In just a few years, I’ve\u00a0watched Bad Bunny graduate from Smart Financial Centre at Sugar Land’s 6,000-plus capacity to multiple nights for tens of thousands of fans at Minute Maid Park and Toyota Center<\/a> through an awe-inspiring mix of hard work, opportunity and celebration of identity.\u00a0It’s the American dream, reclaimed in his own image, which is really the\u00a0essence and expression of what it means.<\/p>\n Fans hold up a Puerto Rican flag while Bad Bunny performs at Amalie Arena on May 21, 2024, in Tampa, Florida. (Jefferee Woo\/TNS)<\/p>\n That level of success underscores the commercial and culture force of the 65 million Latinos in the U.S. who make up nearly one-fifth of the population. And it speaks to the large percentage who don’t speak Spanish but identify with their culture through music, fashion and food. Almost 80% of U.S. Hispanics say it is not necessary to speak Spanish in order to be considered Hispanic, according to a\u00a0study by the Pew Research Center<\/a>. More than 60% report speaking Spanglish, a combination of Spanish and English, at least sometimes.<\/p>\n In 1992, Gloria Estefan became the first Latin artist to perform at the\u00a0Super Bowl halftime show. She returned in 1999 but Latinos have since been few and far between. The Super Bowl XXXIV halftime show in 2000 featured Christina Aguilera and Enrique Iglesias singing a maudlin\u00a0Disney ballad. For her 2020 performance, Jennifer Lopez\u00a0wore a\u00a0cape featuring the American and Puerto Rican flags and featured children performing\u00a0inside cages. That show also featured Shakira and Bad Bunny.<\/p>\n<\/span><\/div>\n
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