A Ram truck ad that used a speech by Martin Luther King, Jr., is drawing a backlash. The ad shows people doing service-oriented tasks set against audio of King’s speech, which urges people to be “great” by serving the greater good rather than being successful.
It was supposed to highlight the volunteer program Ram Nation. But it was criticized by viewers and ad experts alike for forging too tenuous a connection with the civil rights hero. On Twitter, most people expressed the idea that using King’s speech to “sell trucks” crossed a line between a heartfelt message and exploiting emotions just to push a vehicle. “They pushed it over the edge,” said Kelly O’Keefe, a professor at Virginia Commonwealth University’s Brandcenter.
Wait, why’d the MLK estate let Dodge use King’s words to sell some trucks?
— Ashlee Clark Thompson (@AshleeEats) February 5, 2018
Not a fan of Martin Luther King ‘s words being used to sell me a ducking Dodge.
— Akilah Hughes (@AkilahObviously) February 5, 2018
Not totally sure the Dodge RAM ad guys read that whole MLK speech.. https://t.co/QPa16BGv3d pic.twitter.com/3eFVZjb3BB
— Kate Aronoff (@KateAronoff) February 5, 2018
Black people cant kneel and play football but MLK should be used to sell trucks during the super bowl. Unbelievable.
— Akilah Hughes (@AkilahObviously) February 5, 2018
That MLK excerpt comes from “The Drum Major Instinct” speech, part of which warns against the dangers of unwise consumerism, and ends with King imagining his own funeral. So yeah, that commercial is as crass and gross as you were thinking.
— Joshua D. Rothman (@rothmanistan) February 5, 2018
Next year we’ll see Rosa Parks shilling for Uber: “convenient, but you still have to sit in the back.”
— Kashana (@kashanacauley) February 5, 2018
“You wanted to root for it because the cause is good, but it just didn’t end up fitting the brand, so you ended up feeling a little bit manipulated.”
“The use of MLK to promote Ram trucks strikes many people as crass and inappropriate,” said Tim Calkins, a marketing professor at Northwestern University Watching at home, some viewers expressed distaste for the ad as well.
“I liked being reminded of Martin Luther King’s speech (but) I’m not sure it was fitting for a truck commercial,” said Kimberly Stites, who was watching the game in Gretna, Nebraska. “I would have liked it better if they had said something like, ‘This reminder of all that we can be brought to you by ….’”
Fiat Chrysler said in a statement that it worked closely with the King estate on the ad.
