Nike Inc. is one of the multinational corporations in American engaged in manufacturing, development design, and marketing of apparel, footwear, and accessories among other items (Knight, & Greenberg, 2002, 563). They used Colin Kaepernick as a celebrity in the advertisement campaign for their products which made them sell handsomely. The celebrity move involved psychological entrepreneurship theory, which advocates for the use of the mental and emotions to win more consumers for their products. Due to the police racial injustices in the USA such as shooting African Americans, Colin protested against the inhuman act by being the first player of National Football League to kneel during the national anthem (Chaney, Sanchez, &Maimon, 2019, 136) He had begun this action to resist the police racial injustices. The act raised a lot of controversies in the country with many including President Trump perceiving it as an act of disobedience to the American flag. This made the NFL and Nike Corporation to oust him as there were boycotts of Nike products in the state causing the company’s sale to deteriorate (Carrington and BoykoffIs, 2018, 1). The actions taken by Nike Corporation are perceived as an act of corporate greed and exploitative. The paper provides a detailed examination using theories and argumentative evidence to show this case as that of corporate greed and exploitative.
Protesting against Colin by some protestors was the main cause of Nike’s Corporation action; protestors claimed that the Nike Corporation response showed the corporate’s greed and exploitative nature thus not genuine (Pengelly 2018, 1). The National Hockey League Coach John Tortorella in his argument against the act said that Colin Kaepernick and the other players who joined him in kneeling were right (Bryant, 2018, 112). He argued that Colin and the other players had not engaged in the act before the racial injustices of the African American begun. They had always given respect to the flag and the National Anthem. Tortorella gives Colin support by claiming that he was also fighting for their country, the flag and the National Anthem in his way (Healy, Kirton, and Noon, 2010, 491). He went on stating that Kaepernick was fighting for the oppressed and if the flag and the national anthem meant equality for all, then the police should stop the heinous acts of racial injustices (Girton & Greene 2016, 32). He thus suggested that the action taken by Nike Corporation was meant for exploitative, greed and the company’s gain. The decision made by the company at this point used economic theory concept which only concentrates on the economic benefit of the business and not any activity that derails the entrepreneur’s profit.
The other evidence to show that the action taken by Nike Corporation is that of greed and exploitation originates from the Representative Beto O’Rourke. He argues that the protest did not suggest that Colin was not patriotic to the nation. Beto claims that after all patriotism is not a more important virtue than justice (Haerens, 2018, 171). He went on by arguing that America in its nature has remained inconsequential if the Americans cannot provide the right term for justice its real meaning. O’Rourke went on reiterating that if the flag is big enough to support the police killings, then there is no need to respect it, therefore should be changed. Beto adopts the view that the Americans, in this case, must either maintain to embrace freedom or take to racist violence (Platt, 2011, 337). According to him, the act that was taken by the nation, as well as Nike Corporation, is hypocritical in nature. And it is this pretentious nature that has resulted in death, frustrations, conflicts, and pain on others (Arthur, 2008, 11). He concludes by saying that the status quo cannot persist with the police brutality and that Nike Corporation should avoid the disguise as they are acting out of greed and exploitation to win back the public trust. At this, they employed the entrepreneurial social theory which advocates that the business should pay more attention to the surrounding and social relationship to succeed.
In conclusion, the act taken by Nike Corporation was more of the company’s greed and exploitative mode to gain back the previous market share. From the arguments provided by John Tortorella, and Beto O’Rourke shows that Colin was just but trying to protest to shun the police racial injustices peacefully. He did not mean to taint the company’s picture by the advert to guarantee him the sendoff. The company in this case employed social and economic theories to bring back their previous picture to gain. The act, therefore, was not genuine, showing their greed and exploitative move.
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