As you no doubt know by now, the new ‘Dream Crazy’ campaign by Nike (below) has already generated a shit tonne of conversation. Rather than add to the obvious “Kaepernick this/Kaepernick that” ruckus, I’d like to point out what no one is saying about it.

Does the negative reaction to the Kaepernick component of this ad prove that some people are so interested in whether this guy’s actions were patriotic enough, that they’re completely prepared to overlook the fact this ad is actually also about a celebration of, and empowerment of, all kinds of people? And the usually marginalised ones at that? Of people with disabilities who rise above? Of people of colour. Of women. Of refugees. Even of people who lose weight and overcome illness. Name me one other brand, or ad, who has highlighted the success of a women’s sports team in its mainstream campaign. (The US women’s team is the single most successful women’s national soccer team in the world, but of course get paid a fraction of what even a B-grade men’s team would, and most people would have no clue who they even are.)

And yet here we are debating Kaepernick because we’d rather fight about whether or not protesting black lives is patriotic. I guess Nike knew including him would be a focus, but this ad is longer than his bit. Bigger than his actions alone.
The fact so many are completely prepared to overlook the other one and a half minutes of this two minute video to focus on the one bit they can be outraged by, probably shows exactly how the world treats people of colour, women, people with disabilities… overlooked and not important enough to even include in the broader conversation when we have an opportunity to get angry and outraged and focus on a bloke and what he did at a football match instead. And why it’s so important somebody somewhere celebrates what they do, even if it’s a sporting company trying to sell shoes, considering so many people are more than happy to, at best, ignore them completely.

I happen to quite like Nike running shoes. And can only hope that as a company, they’ve improved since their ‘sweat shop’ production days. In the meantime, I’m more than happy to celebrate this brave, and important, piece of communication they’ve put out to the world. They could have played it safe. They could have done more of the same. Instead, they dreamed crazy.

Sputnik

I don’t send out newsletters very often, and sure as shit don’t send spam, but if you’re keen to get semi-regular updates of the stuff I wrote, click here to sign up.