Nike Ad Showcasing Racial Discrimination in Japan Creates Social Media Debate

The latest ad video of Nike Japan showcasing women athletes and other minorities, like people from Korean descent, getting bullied and facing racism has prompted a heated debate on social media. The two-minute video, which shows the real-life experience of three women soccer players of mixed race, has not gone well with the Twitterati and they called it out.

The commercial with the tagline, “Keep Moving: Yourself, the Future,” released on November 30 and shows several teen girls getting bullied and facing racial discrimination in school, however, they are united by a desire to cope with their problems and prove themselves through their ability and love for soccer.

Ever since the video has been shared on the microblogging site, it has garnered over 16 million views and 21,700 retweets along with tons of mixed reactions. While many users slammed the brand said that the ad has misrepresented Japanese society, some have called it a good move. One of the users tweeted to Nike and asked them not to portray Japan as a bad Country and said the he would never buy Nike shoes.

Another user tweeted to call out Nike Japan.

One of the netizens shared a picture of 2019 soccer team featuring players from different races and asked the brand to stay from politics and don’t raise a problem that doesn’t really exist. He also wrote that Japan doesn’t discriminate against other people from other countries.

A netizen called it “too much”, adding that Japanese don’t do discrimination like it is shown in the commercial.

Some other user tweeted that Nike portrays as if there are lots of racial discrimination in Japan, however, that’s not true.

Here are some more tweets :

Meanwhile, Nike Japan reacted to all the tweets and captioned the commercial as, “The power of sports is not just on the pitch. If we all work together, the future will be more open to us.”