The Super Bowl used to be one of those rare American moments where everyone could just agree to watch some football, eat nachos, and complain about the commercials. Not anymore. This year’s game between the Seattle Seahawks and New England Patriots became a cultural battleground before anyone even kicked off.
The setting itself was loaded with symbolism. Levi’s Stadium sits in the heart of Silicon Valley, surrounded by the companies reshaping our world whether we asked them to or not. Nvidia and AMD are neighbors here, their chips powering the AI gold rush that had OpenAI and Anthropic literally fighting for attention via competing Super Bowl ads. The irony of AI companies spending millions on ads to reach humans wasn’t lost on anyone paying attention.
The Prediction Market Frenzy
Something weird happened in the lead-up to this game. Sports betting has always been part of football culture, but this year saw an explosion of activity on platforms like Kalshi and Polymarket. The weird part? A lot of this was happening in California, where traditional sports betting remains illegal.
These prediction markets operate in a legal gray area that feels very Silicon Valley. One fan we talked to dismissed them entirely, saying he’d rather stick with “official platforms like at MGM or any of the actual casino-run sportsbooks.” Another guy, Jim Lockhart from Boston, claimed he had “a mortgage on it” when asked about betting. He’d placed wagers on everything from the coin toss to the Gatorade color.
The Technology enabling this new betting landscape is making gambling more accessible than ever, and it’s not clear anyone’s thought through what that means long-term.
Bad Bunny and the Manufactured Outrage
Then there’s the halftime show controversy. Bad Bunny, fresh off making history with the first Spanish-language album to win Grammy Album of the Year, was set to headline. This apparently sent certain corners of the internet into a meltdown.
Turning Point USA organized a competing “All-American Halftime Show” featuring Kid Rock and Brantley Gilbert. The whole thing would be almost funny if it wasn’t so depressing. Bad Bunny is Puerto Rican. Puerto Rico is part of the United States. Puerto Ricans are American citizens. This shouldn’t be complicated.
The reactions from fans at the tailgate told the whole story. One Patriots fan said flat out: “I think it’s disgusting that there’s a guy who doesn’t speak English who’s playing at the Super Bowl.” When corrected about Bad Bunny being American, he didn’t seem to care. He planned to protest by going to the beer line during halftime.
Meanwhile, other fans were genuinely excited. Tayler Alexis, who works in venture capital funding the Business of tech, was thrilled. She’d been hearing Bad Bunny rehearse from her apartment across from the stadium. Another dad, initially indifferent, said he’d actually become interested in Bad Bunny after hearing the controversy and listening to a few songs on SiriusXM.
“Before, I wasn’t, to be honest,” he admitted. “Because of that whole controversy, they played a couple Bad Bunny songs. I’m like, yeah, dude. I’m all for it now.”
The ICE Elephant in the Room
Perhaps nothing captured the current American moment better than the rumors about Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents potentially conducting operations at the Super Bowl. Even though the NFL and California Governor Gavin Newsom explicitly said there would be no immigration enforcement tied to the game, the fear persisted. Anti-ICE protesters hit the streets anyway.
Fan reactions ranged wildly. Jim from Boston quipped “we love ICE. In my drinks and on the streets.” He got a laugh, but the joke felt hollow. Other fans were genuinely concerned. Tayler Alexis mentioned seeing people on Instagram distributing information about Fifth Amendment rights. “It’s just disgusting, right? Like very vile. Leave people alone.”
A veteran who’d served 12 years in the Air Force had perhaps the most nuanced take. “I’m not an ICE guy. I’ve seen them round up people at the Home Depot, and if they’re really rounding up criminals, yes, let’s do that. But they’re rounding up families and stuff like that. We don’t need to be doing that.”
One New Jersey fan who brings his family to every Super Bowl noted something interesting. Despite all the talk of friction and protests, “the power of the NFL is unbelievable. The city, everybody behaves. They just go inside and let the Super Bowl happen.” In his experience traveling to different host cities over 15 years, the NFL somehow makes everyone “play nice for a week.”
Silicon Valley Sideshow
Almost as a palate cleanser from the political tensions, fans couldn’t stop talking about the Waymo robotaxis cruising around San Francisco. For many visitors, this was their first exposure to fully autonomous vehicles, and it genuinely blew their minds.
Scott Weber, who’d flown in from Australia for his birthday, went on a Waymo ride and “sat up the front, videotaped it, sent it to everyone at home.” Multiple fans mentioned plans to ride in one before leaving town. The Boston dad summed it up: “It’s unnerving that there’s a car with nobody in there, but I see them all over the place. I think they might be safer than some of the other drivers. They probably drive better than my wife.”
The fascination with autonomous vehicles felt almost quaint compared to the heavier conversations happening around immigration and cultural identity. Here was technology people could marvel at without the weight of politics crushing the moment.
What Football Used to Be
That same Boston dad, despite his offensive comments about Bad Bunny, said something that probably resonated with a lot of people regardless of politics: “We gotta make America smile more again. Everything’s gotten so political. Football does not need to be political.”
But that ship has sailed, hasn’t it? When half the country sees a Puerto Rican artist performing at halftime as a political statement requiring counter-programming with Kid Rock, we’re beyond the point where sports can be an escape. The Super Bowl is just another battlefield now, where every choice from the performers to the ad buys to the location itself gets weaponized in whatever culture war is trending that week.
The real question isn’t whether football should be political, but whether there’s anything left in American life that we haven’t managed to turn into a loyalty test and tribal identifier.
