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Nike Japan Made an Ad About Racism. Now There Are Calls for a Boycott.

The sports gear giant released an ad on Twitter featuring anti-Blackness among Japanese teenagers. It has been praised and reviled online.

A new ad from Nike that tackles racism in Japan that is drawing anger from some viewers, The Guardian reports. “The Future Isn’t Waiting,” the two-minute clip released on Twitter last week, follows the fictional stories of three teenagers experiencing bullying at school. One is biracial; classmates are shown accosting her in the bathroom and touching her hair without her consent. In another shot, a Korean student reads an online post with the words “Zainichi problem,” referring to the Korean diaspora in Japan. The ad has been lauded online, but others called for a boycott. One commentator wrote, “Is Japan really such a country full of discrimination? It feels like you’re creating a false impression of Japan.” Nike Japan did not comment to The Guardian about the backlash. Tennis superstar Naomi Osaka, who is Haitian American and Japanese, has been public about the racism she has confronted in Japan, which is notorious for its problems with xenophobia.

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Alaina Demopoulos

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