On February 7, 2016, musician Beyoncé Knowles performed her single “Formation” at the Super Bowl 50 halftime show during the game between the Carolina (North Carolina) Panthers led by Quarterback Cam Newton and the Denver (Colorado) Broncos led by Peyton Manning. The halftime show opened with British rock group Coldplay performing their songs including “Yellow,” “Viva la Vida,” “Paradise,” and “Adventure of a Lifetime,” with the Los Angeles Youth Orchestra conducted by Gustavo Dudamel and the University of Southern California (USC) Marching Band. Peter Gene “Bruno Mars” Hernandez and Mark Ronson performed “Uptown Funk.” Beyoncé then performed her single, “Formation.” The singer was dressed in a black leather outfit with golden sashes inspired by Michael Jackson’s outfit at his Super Bowl 27 performance in 1993. Her backup dancers were dressed as members of the Black Panther Party.
Beyoncé’s single “Formation” was a hip-hop song that addressed her culture, identity, and success as a Black woman from the Southern United States. She then joined Mars for a verse of “Uptown Funk.” After the halftime show ended, the game continued with the Broncos defeating the Panthers 24-10.
Following the Super Bowl, Beyoncé received considerable criticism for “Formation” from many political and cultural conservatives, law enforcement organizations, and social media users who viewed the song and her performance as being anti-police, anti-American, and anti-White. This led to an anti-Beyoncé campaign on social media titled hashtag #BoycottBeyonce. Supporters of Beyoncé countered with their hashtag on Social Media, #IStandWithBeyonce.
On February 16, 2016, when three anti-Beyoncé protesters demonstrated outside of the NFL headquarters in New York City, they faced a much larger group of Beyoncé supporters holding signs that said “Pro-Black doesn’t mean anti-white.” The controversy escalated when The National Sheriffs’ Association (NSA) claimed, without evidence, that Beyoncé’s Super Bowl performance was linked to the killing of seven law enforcement officers. Police unions across the United States subsequently encouraged a boycott of the singer’s “Beyoncé the Formation World Tour.” Some public figures including Louis Abdul Farrakhan and Killer Mike defended Beyoncé’s Super Bowl performance.
Beyoncé responded to the protests by telling Elle magazine, “I’m an artist and I think the most powerful art is usually misunderstood.” She also argued that her song “Formation” was not an anti-police song, and that she personally respected police officers. Despite her statement, “Formation” was adopted as a protest song by a number of sociopolitical movements including the Black Lives Matter movement and the #MeToo movement. Many observers also considered Beyoncé’s Super Bowl performance as a foreshadowing of NFL protests led by San Francisco Quarterback Colin Kaepernick when he and others chose to kneel instead of stand when the United States national anthem was played at the start of games during the 2016 NFL Season. Those protests gained nationwide attention and forced Kaepernick and other players out of football. The protest also made professional sports settings, and in particular, NFL events, the center of an ongoing debate about the role of politics and social justice at sports events like the Super Bowl. The controversy escalated after the George Floyd murder in 2020. The latest example is the ongoing debate over the Kendrick Lamar halftime performance in Super Bowl 59.
