Colin Kaepernick's latest Nike ad wins Emmy for outstanding commercial
The latest Nike ad won a Creative Arts Emmy for the best commercial on September 15 night. The ad featured former NFL star Colin Kaepernick.
The ad, titled 'Dream Crazy', was unveiled around a year ago and shows Kaepernick looking straight at the camera. The image has some text printed over it which reads, "Believe in something, even if it means sacrificing everything. #JustDoIt." When the ad was released, it received mixed reactions from social media users.
Some loved the ad while others hated it and also demanded the boycott of the "anti- American" business. Even though Kaepernick has been an athlete for Nike since 2011, he has not played on an NFL team since 2016. Kaepernick was the center of controversy when he started to kneel down during the national anthem in protest against the treatment of African-Americans.
Ever since, many players from different NFL teams either kneel or raise a fist during the national anthem as part of the same protest. POTUS Donald Trump does not seem to be in agreement with the movement. He has even said that any player who kneels is a "son of a bitch" and should be fired.
Trump has also called out networks which had announced that they would not air the national anthem part of the pregame. Both the league as well as the NFLPA have stood up for players who want to protest in a peaceful manner. In response to the ad, Nike released a statement saying, "The National Football League believes in dialogue, understanding, and unity. We embrace the role and responsibility of everyone involved with this game to promote meaningful, positive change in our communities."
"The social justice issues that Colin and other professional athletes have raised deserve our attention and action," the statement concluded. Nike has released a couple of other socially and politically focused ads which feature many different athletes, all from varying backgrounds.
Very recently, Nike had also collaborated with the Toronto Raptors when they released a team-branded hijab for Muslim women athletes.