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Apple Music Super Bowl LVII Halftime Show

Source: Kevin Mazur / Getty

Singer Rihanna made Super Bowl history last night by taking the worlds biggest stage performing in a world reveal that made her the first pregnant woman to headline a Super Bowl Halftime Show, while under the ‘Umbrella’ of scrutiny that she sold-out, performing to a sold out crowd.

But did Rihanna really sell-out?

Not long after Rihanna and her boyfriend rapper A$AP Rocky gave birth to their first child, Rihanna was asked to headline the 2023 Apple Music Super Bowl LVII halftime show, after declining to perform in the 2019 Halftime show.  According to Rihanna in 2019 because she decided to abstain from playing to show solidarity with Colin Kaepernick, a quarterback who said he was shunned by the NFL for kneeling before games in support of the Black Lives Matter movement. Colin Kaepernick took a knee during the pregame performance of the National Anthem in 2016 to protest against racial injustice and police brutality in the United States.  A move that led to the former San Fransisco 49er Quarterback being allegedly blackballed.  In 2019 Colin Kaepernick reached a confidential settlement with the NFL.

“I couldn’t dare do that. For what? Who gains from that? Not my people. I just couldn’t be a sellout. I couldn’t be an enabler. There’s things within that organization that I do not agree with at all, and I was not about to go and be of service to them in any way.” –Rihanna Vogue 2019

Fast forwarding a few years to 2022/23 the NFL who had been the talk of institutional racism that’s not only prevented Black quarterbacks from thriving but also relegated many to Canada, revealed change with a now change in the color of leadership behind the snap, with a record number of starting quarterbacks, that produced a historic first in Super Bowl history, in which both teams where led by starting black quarterbacks.

Plus, did that voice announcing the halftime show sound familiar?  MC Lyte?

In 2023 Rihanna is a first time Oscar nominee for her smash hit “Lift Me Up” from Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, a nomination that is very much more obtainable now then in 2019.

The question is if Colin Kaepernick settled in 2019, did Rihanna sell-out in 2023 or did she just settle/accept change?

Sam Sylk Show with Bijou Star

Source: Radio One Digital