Supplemental Response #3 (Devin Glenn)

I have a random, little story to share before getting to my actual post: Last week, I had a Zoom interview with one of the internship managers at Netflix. As our conversation progressed, she invited me to share a recent experience I’d had working with a group. Immediately, my mind went to the group assignment we had in this class a few weeks ago, and we then spent the next little bit traveling down a delightful tangent, communally contemplating Foucault’s work and the presence of the panopticon in modern reality television. Being able to connect with a complete stranger using material from our class made me happy and felt so fulfilling!

Ok! Now on to the main event: I am currently a reader for CTCS 466. Last week, we prescreened Ben Affleck’s Air—a film I found to be nothing short of pro-capitalistic, corporate-reaffirming propaganda with a not-so-secret agenda to praise the “working-class spirit” of Nike’s founders and leaders. The entire time I was watching the movie, I kept thinking to myself, “How is centering an entire narrative around the creation of a shoe justifiable in the slightest?”. And that’s not even addressing the manner in which the film all-too-easily glossed over Nike’s problematic history of using Taiwanese sweatshops to manufacture their products. You can imagine my shock, then, when we began our class yesterday with a discussion of the film and nearly every student who shared their thoughts said they loved it. One student even went as far as to say that the fact that Nike “wasn’t involved in the making of the film” (whatever that means) in combination with the film’s celebration of the company is a true testament to Nike’s merit. As I read Jenkins’ piece, his explorations into the blurring of what is copyrighted material and what is not in a contemporary media landscape stood out to me, especially as it applies to Air. I refuse to believe that Nike truly took a hands-off approach to a film which, by necessity, revolves around them. Certainly, it’s not hard to imagine Nike’s legal team insisting that the film’s creators sign an agreement promising not to portray the company in a bad light before giving them permission to recreate their likeness on screen. And if this is indeed the case, it raises a multitude of questions regarding censorship, not through governmental regulation, but through corporate law.