On Thursday, Sept. 6, Nike released a new advertisement featuring many athletes who have overcome hardship to become among the top of their sport. The advertisement is narrated by Colin Kaepernick, the former NFL player who led the movement to kneel during the anthem. It encourages viewers to believe in themselves and nurture their dreams, no matter how crazy they might seem. While this may sound like an innocent and motivational ad, many people quickly protested the use of Kaepernick by burning their Nike products and merchandise.

The slogan, “Believe in something. Even if it means sacrificing everything,” was seen by some as a reference to Kaepernick kneeling during the national anthem to protest police brutality and losing his job as a result. Some students felt that the advertisement was a bad move by Nike because Kaepernick is too controversial a figure.

“I think it was a poor decision to create such a large controversy. I think they should have avoided it. To some maybe [Kaepernick] is an inspiration, but I feel that Nike shouldn’t be meddling in such political matters,” Vibhav Iyengar ‘21 said.

On the contrary, some students felt that the use of Kaepernick in the ad is Nike’s right and that the backlash is hypocritical. There are accusations of hiding when companies do not disclose their position on political topics, yet when they do they are attacked by those who have opposite views.

“I think the use of Kaepernick is justified because companies making political statements and putting their views out there isn’t necessarily something wrong. I know that there has been a lot of backlash to the ad but to me that doesn’t make sense. It’s not the first time a company has taken a political stance,” Arnav Gunwani ‘21 said.

“In fact, you see all this outcry about how companies should be disclosing more of their information like donations to political campaigns and things like that. But on the other hand, when they do make public statements and actually put out what their values are and what they believe in, then you see this backlash.”

Others felt that it was a daring move that could be considered successful because of the attention it received.

“It was very bold because it did result in a lot of backlash,” Collin Le ‘21 said. “But it could pay off, and it got a lot of media interest because it used a person that is very controversial.”

Some students feel that while there were certainly repercussions, the ad has also garnered support among many people.

“It’s really hard to say whether it hurt or helped Nike. I’ve mostly seen videos of people retaliating against it and not much love,” Carson Haverda ‘21 said.

Despite the response seeming overwhelmingly negative, he saw positive reactions as well when he looked a little closer.

“I saw an Instagram account that posted a video of them destroying shoes and a bunch of people in the comments were saying how bad the burning was and how Nike is an amazing corporation for making the ad,” Haverda said.

President Donald Trump responded to the ad by saying the use of Kaepernick sent a terrible message, one that he believed shouldn’t be sent. Some students thought that was not an appropriate response.

“I think it’s really unprofessional, how he responded to that, especially him being the face of our country. He shouldn’t be picking sides,” Haverda said. “He was saying how it was dumb of them to do that and how they are just losing money off of it when he should’ve been saying that was a very brave thing to do, props to Nike.”

The ad also featured many moving stories of athletes that started from the bottom but still rose to huge heights.

“It’s really inspiring because some people don’t grow up with everything provided to them,” Adam Busfield ‘21 said. “But these [athletes] show that you can be great even if life doesn’t line up exactly right if you keep on going through adversity.”

In fact, the other athletes’ stories are the focus, and they are simply narrated by Kaepernick.

“I think that the ad does focus a lot more on the stories of the other athletes that are featured than people give it credit for,” Gunwani said. “I feel like the presence of Kaepernick has just overshadowed the rest of it and turned attention away from the fact that Nike is trying to show the great journeys that these players have made. Even if Kaepernick is a controversy, these other athletes that are in the ad are still a huge source of inspiration and I feel like people shouldn’t be ignoring the rest of the ad just because Kaepernick is in it.”

As far as money goes, some students believe the ad will boost sales because it will appeal to more liberal people..

“Contrary to most people’s beliefs, I think that it will help improve sales,” Iyengar said. “They have divided up the world into a small group of highly conservative people who believe in strict, American patriotism and another, larger group of liberal-thinking minds. The larger group of liberal-thinking minds comprises most of the world.”

Nike’s stock initially fell after the release of the advertisement, but has now fully recovered from the drop and is going up once again. In addition, though the stock price dropped temporarily, sales shot up 31% right after the release of the ad campaign. But the purpose of the ad was not to improve short-term revenue, it was to paint a long-term picture of what Nike believes in.

“It just shows that Nike really cares about their customers, everything that is going on in the world, and equality for all,” Haverda said.