A few weeks ago, Nike released a video campaign supporting female athletes called, “Dream Crazier.” You can check out the video below.
The video is narrated by Serena Williams and shows clips of powerful females in the sports industry, from basketball to gymnastics. The entirety of the video revolves around this premise: that women are often viewed as abnormal and inadequate for attempting to excel within this historically male-dominated field. Further, their emotions and actions tend to be received negatively simply because they are women.
“If we show emotion, we’re called dramatic.”
“When we’re too good, there’s something wrong with us.”
“If we get angry, we’re hysterical or irrational.”
The theme of the video is so touching not just because it shows women pushing the limits, but because it shows women being real. It shows them crying, smiling, cheering, screaming in anger, sweating. It shows them failing and breaking world records.
Serena closes it out with the line, “So if they wanna call you crazy, fine. Show them what crazy can do.”
I applaud Nike so much for this. While women have the same rights as men in today’s western society, it may be a long time before we concretely escape the mark that centuries of patriarchal structure has left on societal gender dynamics. Women still struggle to be accepted equally in many fields, sports being a prime example. And it is absolutely wrong that human emotions are so often gendered female in a very unfavorable way.
Thank you, Nike. I am so proud to be a woman.