Child prostitution and drug running tends to sharply increase whenever a developing country is forced to adopt western labor standards.
Granted, playing nice with the government's doesn't solve the underlying problems either.
The two things aren’t related directly- even if you want them to be or try to make them. Nike doesn’t exist to fund “social awareness” they make athletic gear. Maybe they support Kaepernik. A cynic would say Nike is well aware that it’s core customer base in fashion and casual athletic wear, as well as its primary consumer athletics customers and collectors would either see the move as a “positive” one- or not be affected by it in their buying decisions. Nike still supplies the NFL and team gear, and signed an 8 year extension to do so until 2028- when it will be up for renewal- and historically the NFL and Nike renew their contracts to each other. So if we want to be cynical- Nike backing Kaepernik can be seen as “good business” the way it was handled.
If you want to speak out about Nike sweat shops- that’s not a bad fight, but maybe leave Kaepernik out of it- and while we could say as a global community- we all share “the same fight,” also realize that speaking out for racial injustice in America and speaking up for exploited workers abroad. That somewhat like assuming that the same person who wants to see a stop light put in at a local intersection is as passionate or even cares about reducing the number of drunk driving crashes on a stretch of road 2,000 miles from where they live. A life is a life- but people only have so much resources and choose where they put them.
Granted, playing nice with the government's doesn't solve the underlying problems either.