Last week, after Beyoncé’s “Formation” dropped and after she sang it at the Super Bowl in a Black Panther-alluding performance, it seemed some people were so offended by a display of proud, celebratory blackness that they were going to protest Beyoncé outside the NFL headquarters in New York. (If anyone was questioning whether SNL‘s spoof of some white peoples’ reactions to Beyoncé’s video was exaggerating, this may have seemed like your answer.)
An utterly ridiculous — but perhaps trolling, given the low turnout — Eventbrite post spread across the Internet last week, calling for people to rally against the pop star for her “slap in the face to law enforcement” (ignoring the fact that the video was a commentary on how law enforcement is so often much more than a slap on the face to black lives) and calling Beyoncé’s video/performance itself a work of “hate speech and racism.” Luckily, it seems very few people showed up to stand by whoever wrote this thing — allegedly a pro-police group called “Proud of the Blues.”
As CBS reported, by 8 a.m. this morning, there was little sign of an Anti-Beyoncé protest. However, after that original EventBrite post went public, another protest had been called for — this time by a user named Black Girl Rising, as a “counter protest to a racist, ahistorical attack on the Black Panther Party and Beyonce, plus an excuse to celebrate a very awesome song and #BlackGirlMagic moment.” And this Anti-Anti Beyoncé protest, it seems, is currently happening:
The original protest against Beyoncé, reports The Cut, boasted a full three supporters, who showed up late. At first, there was only one — this guy:
https://twitter.com/CharlesPulliam/status/699597842998960128/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Eventually, he was joined by a man who volunteers for the Ted Cruz campaign and a woman with a beanie that said “POLICE.”