Though I’m not a big fan of Apple’s Think Different ads, I think it fitting that Apple makes a tribute to the late great Civil Rights activist, Rosa Parks, on its homepage this week. Sure, it’s because Apple used the iconic Parks image as part of its Think Different campaign, but it also says that Apple–though a profit seeking company like any other–encompasses a “for the people” image and objective in what it produces for its users.
It may be a bit of a stretch for many to see a connection between Apple, Parks and the Civil Rights Movement, but I think Apple has been about helping users from various walks of life release their creativity and use tools of multimedia communication in ways that were traditionally only available to a smaller percentage of people with the money, skills, and/or talent. In a similar way, Park’s courageously conscious defiant act to challenge Jim Crow racial discrimination on December 1, 1955 was a spark that triggered a righteous revolution for true democracy in this country. The freedom marches that resulted from her civil disobedience was nothing less than a movement of people, particularly African American people, releasing their creative energy for change–for equality.
While critics will say that Apple is trying to profit from Parks’s death, her image on their homepage is both refreshing and sincere in its recognition and respect of an activist who forced this country to live up to its theory of democracy.
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