Just one day after he took out the number three spot on the ARIA charts with his new solo record Gemini, and one day after The Killers made a stand for same-sex marriage via a cover Midnight Oil’s ‘Forgotten Years’ at the AFL Grand Final, Macklemore has performed his powerful same-sex anthem ‘Same Love’ at the NRL Grand Final.

Macklemore’s decision to perform his track ‘Same Love’ at the NRL Grand Final has recently resulted in a lot of vitriol and criticism being thrown his way.

In an interview with US radio last week, Macklemore even stated that he was receiving a lot of attention from “angry old white dudes in Australia”, and even acknowledged a petition that was in place to stop him from performing a positive song at a national sporting event. Critics, such as Tony Abbot even took to Twitter to share their stances on the situation, with Abbot writing that “Footy fans shouldn’t be subjected to a politicised grand final. Sport is sport!”

Despite this critisicm, Macklemore’s performance went ahead as planned today, with the rapper performing the track with Mary Lambert, who performs on the studio version of the track as well.

Closing his performance by simply stating “Equality for all,” fans in attendance applauded loudly, with some making heart shapes with their hands, while rainbow coloured streams of smoke poured out from behind the stage area.

Now that Macklemore has performed his powerful track, and the world hasn’t ended because of it, we hope that some of the politicians who protested this performance may start to realise that there is indeed room for positive messages of equality at sporting events.

Check out footage of Macklemore’s performance at the NRL Grand Final below.

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