You don't want to end up with a court trying to figure out whether that usage constitutes fair use. Taking a stand on whether it "should be" fair use isn't what company resources are for.
An accurate representation of corporate legal's general attitude, yeah... just say no to any request because that covers your ass.
Legal troubles are exactly why you have a legal team. Uber didn't ask for permission, neither did OpenAI. Now they're worth billions. Microsoft and Apple do their own fairshare of probably borderline illegal things too.
Yes but they did illegal things that materially increased the value of the company, they didn't send employees off to mug people in alleys just for the fun of it.
Neither is stopping the presses for every little thing.