A Major Threat to Minor Threat?

I'm in a bit of a pickle.

I firmly believe in the idea of fair use. Appropriation and parody are valuable artistic tools, and our first amendment should allow us to use each other's work, provided that we are making a new statement in a new context. Prime example.

Even advertisers get into the appropriation game to hook into a particular mindset, evoke a specific mood or association for a target audience. I'm all for it.

But it's a slippery slope when a corporation like Nike steals from a band that hates corporations. Behold Major Threat.

So if I'm completely for Negativland taking commercial jingles, chewing them up, and regurgitating them as a screed against commercialism, don't I have to be accepting of a corporation appropriating the anti-commercialism of Minor Threat?

Well, Nike didn't exactly chew up the album cover and spit out something different. They pretty much copied it verbatim. And Nike's appropriation is incredibly manipulative of a particular subculture, one that I would hope would see through something like this but probably won't.

Still, the whole thing leaves me confused. And angry. So angry that I think I'll go ahead and listen to some Minor Threat right now.

I'm gonna knock it down
Any way that I can
I'm gonna scream, I'm gonna yell
I don't want to have to use my hands

It's like screaming at a wall
Someday it's gonna fall

You built up that wall around you
And now you can't see out
And now you can't hear my words
No matter how loud I shout

It's like screaming at a wall
Someday it's gonna fall

You're safe inside and you know it
'Cause I can't get to you
And you know I resent it
And my temper grows

You better reinforce those walls
Until you don't have no room to stand
'Cause someday the bricks are gonna fall
Someday I'm gonna use my hands

[source]