“Just Do It” has long been the slogan of Nike, since 1988, in fact. Every year since the campaign began, it has featured many star athletes so that the company could promote their brand as being reliable not only for everyday athletes, but professional athletes as well. This year, for the 30th anniversary of the campaign, Nike chose Colin Kaepernick, the embattled former NFL quarterback.
He has been a free agent since 2016 after he was released for kneeling on the field during the national anthem in protest of racial inequality against people of color. His actions caused a lot of controversy, thus his dismissal from his team. Kaepernick has had a contract with Nike since 2011, but his face was not often used in their advertisements because of his controversy — until now.
The photo is a close up, black and white photo of Kaepernick’s face with the words, “Believe in something. Even if it means sacrificing everything.” This campaign has caused a huge uproar from citizens who are vehemently opposed to Kaepernick’s actions. Many have been cutting the Nike logo off their Nike products, or even burning their Nike products in protest of the campaign.
It has also caused a huge outpouring of memes, with people parodying the campaign’s design and language. Nev Schulman, one of the hosts of MTV’s Catfish, got into the fun himself and shared a funny version of the campaign to his Instagram account on Saturday.
In his version of the photo, Schulman shared a close up photo of his own face, in black and white, with the message, “Believe in love. Unless you met online and they can’t facetime.” Schulman refers to one of the three cardinal guidelines that indicate an online love may be a catfish, a person probably is not who they say they are if they are not willing to at least facetime you.
The post is one of Schulman’s most popular Instagram posts, garnering more than 200,000 likes in less than 12 hours.
Schulman’s charm and humor are part of what makes him such a successful host to the show, and is an integral part of the show’s success. Though his Catfish co-host, Max Joseph, recently announced he would be leaving the show, viewers are confident that Schulman (and whatever new co-host is chosen to replace Joseph) will still be able to carry on.
