September 7th, 2022 Bad Bunny played at the Alamodome in San Antonio, and around 50,000 fans are expected. This concert is so huge the city of San Antonio encouraged people to avoid downtown and to use public transportation. People who are not devoted fans may wonder why would anyone with the name Bad Bunny be THIS popular.
For context Benito Ocasio aka Bad Bunny, is a Puerto Rican rapper and singer who got his start on SoundCloud. Yes ,SoundCloud. I remember him taking off in 2016 with features on so many other reggaeton songs and now he is 7th on Spotify’s most streamed artist worldwide (640,323,389 monthly listeners).
Although when thinking of a Bad Bunny song many assume it’s about two main reggaeton topics: sex and drinking. And yes some of his songs are a bit R rated but this is not the reason for his popularity with Latin youth.
To understand the impact of his songs we need to focus on Hispanic and Latin culture who flourish on traditional ideals. Your usual machismo way of thinking and homophobic ways who get passed down from generation to generation and it’s Gen Z’s turn to break that. Constantly in reggeaton culture it’s of course male dominant and emphasize on degrading women and feeding into the toxic masculinity. On the contrary Bad Bunny’s hit song “Yo Perreo Sola” is a song on women’s sexuality and empowerment. That same song made way for him to speak on trans issues, by dressing up in drag for the music video. After that he spoke up on behave of Alexa, a Puerto Rican trans women who was killed for being just that. In his newest album he dedicated a song “Andrea” to another women who was tragically killed and he speaks about the sexual harassment and femicides that has consumed Latin America.
The reason he has become such a global sensation is his carefree nature of speaking on social and political issues in the United States and his home Puerto Rico. His latest concert in Puerto Rico he brought attention to his song “El Apagon”,which calls out the betrayal of the government and the gentrification that is pushing the natives into poverty and homelessness. Throughout his career his shows massive gratitude to his fellow Puerto Ricans by using his platform to showcase these issues. A lot of people are not familiar with his non-profit the Good Bunny Foundation whose main goal is to provide aid to the youth and fund extracurriculars in PR.
This generation is putting an artist on a pedestal who uses his talent to bring up issues our generation is left to fix and that is Bad Bunny.