Ruffle some feathers

I'm going to do something that I rarely do and wade into a burgeoning conflict on social media.

I don't do this in this blog because I like to keep it focused on coaching or my opinion as it relates to rowing.  That's where I am most comfortable, and that is where I feel that I can make arguments that are relatively reasonable given my experience.

But I've watched as my Facebook feed has been taken over by folks posting for and against this, and I feel that since it is a topic involving an athlete, it does fall into a category that can be covered by this blog.

What follows is simply my opinion on the matter.  I believe that we're too quick to get angry, and dig our heels in, and too slow to step back, remove the emotional gut reaction, and listen.

What subject am I talking about?  The Colin Kaepernick commercial series run by Nike.  This is my post on Facebook and my general opinion.

I see the divided opinion on Nike and Colin Kaepernick, and I read a Tweet raising awareness about Nike's alleged business practices including using sweatshops, and profiting from it. The message was that this new ad campaign by Nike wasn't about awareness but about selling the Swoosh.

Ok. Let's stop for a moment. Let's roll back the hatred, and the gut reactions, and reflect for a moment. In grad school we talked about taking a 1' stop, and that's what we're doing to do right now.

Everybody chill, and breathe. Let's all go find a mirror. Hall, bathroom, front closet, doesn't matter. Find a mirror. Now, close your eyes and breathe in slowly....and exhale slowly. Repeat three or four times. Feel the pulse rate dropping...dropping...tension leaving the fingers and shoulders....roll your neck around slowly.

And relax.

Now open your eyes and look at the reflection in the mirror.

Take a good long look in the mirror. How much Nike gear have you purchased? What about Adidas? What country did the clothing you're currently wearing originate from? How about your bedsheets? Pillows? The car you drive? The bike you ride? The water you're wearing? The sunglasses?

Continue to stare at yourself. By this point, you're probably not. You're looking around sheepishly. Yea, you know you've got Nikes in your closet, don't you? Yea, you love Adidas. That shirt with the perfect V-neck?

Mhm.

Let's look at your Twitter/Facebook account and begin counting the social activism events you've attended. Not this year. Not when social activism became more mainstream and more noticeable, but before that. Long before it was cool to post what you were doing on Twitter/Facebook/Instagram, start a Reddit, YouTube, etc.

Huh. Looks like we're not quite the "visionaries" that we immediately felt we were the second we saw Kaepernick's name tied with Nike.

Suddenly we're significantly less active than we felt we were, and our involvement doesn't go back nearly as far as we'd like to believe it did.

And our closet has Nike in it. We've been wearing Nike for years.

Guess what? That money and capitalism and marketing that we're bashing? We're right in the middle of it. Our favorite teams, the ones we loudly support, proudly support, are right in the middle of it. If you participated in high school or collegiate sports, then you've probably pulled on a jersey or set of clothing that had the Swoosh or Three Stripes.

This loud faux outrage is exactly that. Loud. Faux. You're not really that angry. You're only angry now. You see Nike, and you immediately think "profit." Yes, that does happen though we contributed to that bottom line long before Kaepernick was involved.

But we're also overlooking a simple truth: We're talking about it. We're talking about the ads and what they mean and what they should mean. We're so outraged that Nike dares to profit from this ad series - as would any other company - that we're missing the point of the ad series.

A few years ago a few folks began this rather amusing social media campaign to raise awareness for ALS. They accomplished this by dumping a bucket of ice cold water over their heads, and then nominating others to do it. They challenged everyone to raise money for research, and brought ALS to the forefront.

And people participated. And people got angry and felt that dumping water over your head did absolutely nothing to help ALS research.

Nevermind that teams wear pink to show support for Breast Cancer, or wore yellow for LiveStrong, or any number of colored ribbons to bring awareness to other causes, and never mind that no amount of pink, yellow, or other color did a damn thing to help research.

Except, it did. And it does. Which is why we do it.

But no one is outraged that Nike, or Adidas or UnderAmor, or anyone else profits by selling a pink version of a jersey, or gloves. Professional and college teams do it nearly every year, and no one is on Facebook screaming about it.

We're selective about what to be "outraged" over. We care about this, we don't care about that. We'll buy Nike, and wear Nike, and love Nike, and support universities that outfit their teams with Nike, and love professional teams that sport Nike, and love professional athletes who endorse Nike...

...But now that Nike has attached one particular polarizing athlete to it, one who went through the wall to first start bringing attention to a serious problem in this country...

Oh, NOW we, and by "we" we mean Nike has gone too far.

And let's all get a grip and realize that in a month or so, maybe two, this whole "I'm outraged at Nike" will have died just like the last thing we were outraged over.

Less than 96 hours ago, a vast majority of us wore Nike without hesitation. I'm willing to bet that a lot of us still have Nike in our closet.

I have a closet full of Nike gear. And Adidas, and UnderArmor.

Let's get off our soapboxes and drop the pretense.

On a side note, there's only two more months till we can pretend to give a shit that the Starbucks cups aren't "Christmasy" enough.