By the next morning, there was still plenty of heat in the city, most of it aimed at City Hall. Seems like mayor Tom Menino is intent on saving up every possible penny for the expected coronation of homeboy John Kerry at the Democratic National Convention in Boston this summer. So he skimped on portable toilets, something many regard as a necessity when 1.5 million of your closest pigskin pals decide to party downtown for up to seven hours.
There was a similar oversight Sunday night in Houston, where just one giant Port-A-Potty on the Reliant Stadium field would have come in handy to flush Janet Jackson, Justin Timberlake and all their enablers down-or at the very least off-the tubes.
Still, I’m not one who thinks a little halftime breast-baring or any of the rest of the vulgarity is a threat to Western civilization as we know it. In truth, vulgarity is Western civilization as we know it. Just by watching mainstream TV, my teenage daughter and her pals have seen more naked breasts than I did through an entire adolescence of trying to sneak glimpses at my dad’s hidden Playboys. As for forbidden words, just tune into Sportscenter and hear Shaquille O’Neal or Bobby Knight or Jim Calhoun deliver tirades punctuated with more obscenities than Tony Soprano’s boys spew on an average night at the Bada Bing.
If there was anything broadcast during the Super Bowl capable of shocking my daughter and her pals, it was far more likely to have been that warning about the perils of a four-hour erection. And that came to us with both CBS’s and the NFL’s blessings, at a price of more than $30,000 a second delivered into their corporate coffers. (As for the medical advice, thanks. I’ll call the doctor right after I call the Guiness Book of Records.) There was no great conspiracy in this tasteless halftime exhibition. I’m sure CBS brass knew bupkus about the final entertainment plans, though I’m equally certain they would have mobilized all their censorious might if Janet and Justin had been planning to sing about Ronald Reagan sleeping through a cabinet meeting. And I am even more certain that the NFL, that most righteously conservative of sports leagues, didn’t have a clue. Its execs were far too busy during halftime sweeping the end zones for hidden cell phones, pens and other forbidden instruments of celebration.
But that’s no reason to let the league off the hook. The NFL has been hawking the tease of sexy women spilling out of their D-cups for more than 30 years, ever since the first Dallas Cowboys cheerleader strutted her stuff on the same hallowed ground as legendary QB and U.S. Navy straight-arrow Roger Staubach. And correct me if I’m wrong: Is there more than a little sexual innuendo in those Coors Light-official sponsors of the NFL-ads? I for one have never witnessed beautiful young women dancing on toilets, but somehow I suspect that isn’t the last act of that party. (As for “twins,” well that I can’t even begin to imagine. But I assume it’s not a genetics lesson.) The NFL is not fooling anybody. Nobody with the media savvy of that operation can profess to be surprised at anything that happens when you parade misogynistic rappers and rock-and-roll’s tramps du jour out onto center stage. Even I, every bit as clueless as the next middle-aged dad, know there’s going to be some crotch-grabbing by the men, some open-mouthed kissing by the ladies and, yes quite possibly, somebody is going to get “naked” too.
This is not just the petulant whine of a man who had the very bad timing to be chasing a pizza and a whisky refill during halftime and thus was left wondering: where’s instant replay when you really need it? I had been watching with genuine-and escalating-distress as the NFL lumped together flyover salutes to our soldiers, memorial tributes to our astronauts, the singing of “The Star Spangled Banner” and the crass antics of the likes of Nelly, Kid Rock, P. Diddy, Janet, Justin et al. as equal parts in one giant Americana amalgam.
It’s time for the NFL to grow up and embrace the responsibilities that come with being this nation’s premier entertainment. To be the American standard-bearer, the league first must demonstrate that it actually has standards. And those have to be just a little bit loftier than the current ones, which appear to mandate that you can dance in the end-zone only if you’re a woman wearing a skimpy outfit.
