Many of you have heard of the cruel injustice that occurred when George Floyd passed away after police officer, Derek Chauvin, kneeled on his neck. Unfortunately, George is one of the thousands of black people that had their lives inhumanly taken due to racial discrimination. Since the murder, there’s been a resurgence of people, organisations and brands rising up to use their platforms to fight this injustice. Here are a list of brands who have shown their solidarity with #BlackLivesMatter:
- NikeIn the short clip posted by the sports Giant on Twitter, Nike’s famous slogan, “Just Do It”, was replaced with, “For Once, Don’t Do It”. “Don’t turn your back on racism. Don’t accept innocent lives being taken from us. Don’t make any more excuses. Don’t think this doesn’t affect you. Don’t sit back and be silent. Don’t think you can’t be part of the change. Let’s all be part of the change.”
Let’s all be part of the change.#UntilWeAllWin pic.twitter.com/guhAG48Wbp
— Nike (@Nike) May 29, 2020
And surprisingly enough, other shoe brand rivals such as Adidas and Converse even backed up the company, putting aside their competitive differences to stand for what truly matters.
Together is how we move forward.
Together is how we make change. https://t.co/U1nmvMhxB2— adidas (at ?) (@adidas) May 30, 2020
Yes. We’re in. https://t.co/QEd4xeN0yI
— Converse (@Converse) May 29, 2020
- AdidasAdidas also took their own Instagram to address the issue: “Together is how we move forward. Together we have the power to make a change. Together we must fight what is wrong and try to make it right.”
- ReebokEnglish born American-footwear company, Reebok acknowledged the importance of the black community to their existence today: “without the black community, Reebok would not exist. America would not exist. We are not asking you to buy our shoes. We are asking you to walk in someone else’s.”
- DisneyEven Disney had a couple of words to share on inclusivity: “We stand against racism. We stand for inclusion. We stand with our fellow Black employees, storytellers, creators and the entire black community. We must unite and speak out.”
- Netflix
And of course, the rest of the streaming platforms also followed suit. Netflix stressed the importance of acknowledging the power their platform has: “We have a platform, and we have a duty to our Black members, employees, creators and talent to speak up.” - YoutubeIn support of the movement, Youtube changed their profile photo from its original red background and play button to black. “We stand in solidarity against racism and violence. When members of our community are hurt, we all hurt. We’re pledging $1M in support of efforts to address social injustice.”
We stand in solidarity against racism and violence. When members of our community hurt, we all hurt. We’re pledging $1M in support of efforts to address social injustice.
— YouTube (@YouTube) May 30, 2020
- TikTokAnd finally, the platform that you’ve been seeing everywhere: TikTok. “At TikTok we deeply value the diverse voices among our users, creators, artists, partners and employees. We stand with the Black community and are proud to provide a platform where #blacklivesmatter and #georgefloyd generate powerful and important content.”
— TikTok (@tiktok_us) May 30, 2020
While it’s great that these corporate giants are acknowledging the importance of using their powerful platforms to address the issue of racism, many netizens are calling them out for speaking out but not putting these words to action:
Your hypocrisy knows no bounds. As a platform that has done its very best to avoid having to remove any videos from racists, white supremacists and hate mongers, you should be ashamed of even tweeting about this. Too little, too late.https://t.co/ABKLKGypBc
— Sleeping Giants (@slpng_giants) May 30, 2020
Hey @Nike, 'Don't pretend there's not a problem in America.' Not one Black person on your executive leadership team: https://t.co/59e7o4DMgx for a company that's made billions out of Black sports people and consumers. Change THAT. @zanger @adweek https://t.co/16ecpiUqoV
— Cindy Gallop (@cindygallop) May 30, 2020
What do you guys think of this? Let us know in the comments below!
Also read: “I Can’t Breathe, Officer”- Handcuffed Man Dies After Police Officer Knelt on His Neck
