Copyright 2012 by Ewuare X. Osayande
When I first saw the photo of the Adidas sneaker JS
Roundhouse Mid online, I thought it was a crude meme or somebody’s idea of a
bad joke. It was very hard for me to take seriously. What corporation would
place such a product on the market? And why? Then I saw the controversy make
the national TV news and realized this was anything but a virtual hoax.
Given the number of Black athletes that are either sponsored
by Adidas or spokespersons for the sneaker manufacturer – not to mention Hip
Hop’s storied love affair with the brand as articulated in the iconic rap hit
“My Adidas” – one would think that they, of all corporate entities, would never
do something as demeaning as this to a critical consumer base that yields them
tremendous profits and the ever-coveted street cred. But they did. This sneaker
is an insult to a community already injured by the policies of corporations
like Adidas that leave them trapped in debilitating poverty, disproportionately
warehoused throughout this nation’s prisons.
With Rev. Jesse Jackson’s intervention playing a decisive
role, the company has reportedly decided to pull the sneaker which was to hit
the market with a hefty $350 price-tag. Since, many have stated that Adidas
needs to publish an official apology. But this is clearly a case where an
apology won’t cut it.
What Adidas did is nothing more than what any other
corporation does: Produce product for
the enrichment of its owners. The regard for the actual consumer is minimal to
none. They exist to profit. Period. In this case, Adidas was set to not only
exploit the oppression of the Black community, but have us buy our oppression
back at a premium as well. When this kind of bank-rolled bigotry has occurred
in the past, the Black elite’s response has been to call on these corporations
to diversify their executive boards believing that placing Black faces in high
places will provide the necessary stopgap measure to quell such racism. Instead
what has occurred is that these Black VPs become defensive agents for the still
majority-white owners against accusations of racism.
Have you ever stopped and asked yourself why you’ve never
seen a sneaker manufacturing plant in the hood? Given the amount of free
advertising rap artists give these corporate brands and the ton of loot Black
youth cough up to rock their sneaks, it would seem to make sense. Problem is
that it doesn’t make cents. Adidas, like every other multinational corporation,
sets up shop where they can find the cheapest labor to exploit enabling them to
reap the largest net profit.
Right now the company is in hot water in London , and it is not over these “shackle
sneakers” but another kind of shackles. Adidas’ reported use of sweatshop labor
in Indonesia
has come under fire in light of the company being a main sponsor and apparel
provider for the Olympic Games there next month. For child laborers working for
Adidas what these shackles represent is not some throw-back to an American
Antebellum past or a commercialized allusion to the incarceration of a consumer
base. The shackles they wear - although not literal - are still quite concrete
as they are caught in the vice-grip of a wage slavery that is inextricably
linked to the record incarceration of African American youth.
Rather than calling on Adidas to offer a hollow apology that
in the end would amount to good publicity for this degenerate corporation, we
should demand an end to wage slavery and insist on the creation of unionized
jobs in our communities – organizing to free both African American and Southeast
Asian youth from shackles that remain all too real.
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