It's Valentine's Day. While many are on dates, I'm purging myself of built-up thoughts. It's been more than a year since I posted on this blog. Lately, I've had the desire to write about several topics, but haven't found the time. Today, whether or not I have the time, I feel a strong need to write.
Throughout the entire week, there has been a hot topic on my news feed, which is Bad Bunny's Super Bowl halftime show. Many loved the message of love prevailing over hate and "We are all America," listing all the countries in North, South, and Central America, including the Caribbean. Others are looking up the translations of the lyrics they didn't understand and are appalled at what they're seeing, were appalled at the dancing, and just found the whole thing offensive. Some watched Turning Point USA's alternative show instead.
Basically, the halftime show turned into a very large political debate. Someone on a podcast I love suggested that folks leave the offensiveness of the lyrics up to Spanish-speaking families, rather than assuming online translations to be true. They argue that although some of his songs are filthy, the filth was not sung at the halftime show. That was my cue to chime in.
My Spanish is good. I have lived in the Dominican Republic for 18 years. I don't always understand every word, especially if someone is speaking quickly or unclearly, but I can definitely communicate proficiently. My kids were all born here and have lived here their whole lives, studying in Spanish, communicating with their friends in Spanish, etc. They are the ones that have made me aware of all the bad words through their innocent kindergartener points of view. They have been my bad word police, as we know that what is acceptable among adults is not the same as what is acceptable among children.
Although we are not in the US and I have not heard of any locals here who really watch the NFL or the Super Bowl, some of my kids had seen the halftime show by the time I was seeing the posts about the controversy. Their friends had as well. The year before was the same. Everyone seemed to know Kendrick Lamar, and you could hear kids singing, "They not like us".
My now sixteen-year-old son thought some of the dancing was inappropriate, but the most inappropriate reference he heard in the lyrics was the word perrear, which is to twerk. Before I wrote this, I asked one of my daughters to watch the whole show carefully, since she is the best in the family at the Spanish language, always correcting her brother and me. She agreed that perrear was the most inappropriate reference, but argued that it's not a "bad word". The lyrics that stuck with her the most were those that talked about Puerto Rico's problems, such as lack of employment and power outages. The rest, she said, was just music.
As far as the dancing is concerned, we watched some videos of NFL cheerleaders dancing, and the kids didn't see a big difference between it and the dancing they found risqué in the halftime show. They actually thought the cheerleaders' clothing was perhaps more provacative than those in the halftime show. Remember, my kids have never gone to an American football game, and cheerleading doesn't exist where we live. Could it be that part of what made this performance uncomfortable and offensive to many was not objective vulgarity, but the foreignness of it? (Not to mention the political tie, which I'll discuss soon).
Therefore, I conclude that there are many lies floating around about this performance. Yes, Bad Bunny has nasty lyrics, but they weren't sung at the Super Bowl. Now, my kids didn't have to give me any feedback about the first song, "Titi Me Preguntó", as it was quite popular here a few years back and everyone knew how I felt about it. I objected strongly to it probably the first fifty times I heard it, then, of course, eventually found myself singing along. It's not vulgar, but it talks about him having lots of girlfriends, and that he is a heartbreaker. By the end, he concludes that he doesn't want to be like that.
That song is how I learned about Bad Bunny. I was a little surprised when, about a year after it became popular here, my mom knew of him. While she was visiting, my daughter asked her if she knew who an artist singing a different song was. I did not know the answer, but my mom answered correctly that it was Bad Bunny. So he had made his way to a woman from Virginia in her 60s. My mom is half Puerto Rican, but, nonetheless, that was never her music of choice, from what I've known.
I've often wondered about the fact that people from the United States are referred to as American, when America spans the whole Western Hemisphere, not just the United States. There's not even another word for a person from the United States in English that I know of. It's no wonder that so many estadounidenses, therefore, think it's okay to even consider taking over Greenland, a constituent part of Denmark. The assumed superiority is built into the very language. Since there isn't an appropriate word for it in the English language, I think we should just adopt the Spanish word estadounidense to replace American, referring to a person from the United States.
Therefore, I surely applauded the ending of the halftime show, where Bad Bunny made that point loud and clear by saying, "God bless America", then stating the names of all the countries in the Americas and waving their flags. And who can argue with the slogan that was written above it all?
Along with the halftime show is another event that is constantly on my news feed these days. That is the release of the rest of the Epstein files. Earlier today, I felt led to forgive Donald Trump and all of his active supporters. As I read the latest news, I just realized that I am waiting for something bad to happen to him. It's not that I think that it's necessarily wrong to feel that way. I think he should not be in the position that he is, and I am so tired of it all. The end point is that it's not good for me to be harboring hate. It is totally out of my control anyway. I finally decided that I need to forgive them and pray for them, as well as pray for God's will over it all. If there is anything I can do to support God's kingdom on the matter, may he please show me the way.
While I forgive him, I so strongly disagree with so much of what Trump represents. The fear of diversity and the fact that he is working for expansionism, I think, directly contradicts the kingdom of God. Today I watched Senator Cory Booker interview Jeremy Carl, who Trump has nominated for Assistant Secretary of State for International Organizations. When asking him about comments he had made in the past about white erasure and if he has opinions about the racial makeup the U.S. should have, he said he stands with Trump, and that he prioritizes unity over diversity.
I am a farm girl, and this is what I envision. Have you seen a chicken house with all white chickens? Have you seen a chicken house with a diverse array of chickens? One is stunningly beautiful. The other is not.
Likewise, I think Europe is exemplary and beautiful, although I have never visited, in that it has a union of healthy nations that interact peacefully with each other. From what I hear, much of their culture and history has been preserved, not erased by consumerism. The US expanding as it did into Hawaii, for example, and trying to exert control rather than seeking unity without necessarily control is not a good idea in my book. As I write this, Cuba is suffering from their fuel being cut off. I understand that people are dying from not getting medical care. This is the same tactic Haitian gangs use in Haiti to increase their territory. It's terrorism.
Here is what one Hawaiian got from Bad Bunny's halftime show:
Well said Caitlin! No one ever claimed the the half time show was a patriotic event and in comparison to some of the past ones, I found it highly entertaining and was wowed by the seamless flow and amazing energy. We do need our own word for estadounidense but that’s not it; too hard to pronounce. How about united statians or unitedians? It would be great if we could be called UNITERS and reflect that descriptor!
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