After the Category Five Conservative S***storm that blew in after Bud Light decided strike up a brand deal with transgender TikToker Dylan Mulvaney, the company responded to the backlash with a statement as tepid as their beer. “We never intended to be part of a discussion that divides people. We are in the business of bringing people together over a beer,” said Anhauser-Busch in a statement on Twitter. Because, you know, the belief that trans people have the right to exist with or without an ice cold beer in their hand as a “divisive” one.
The company then decided to celebrate Pride Month with another statement about the “controversy.”
“It’s been a challenging few weeks and I think the conversation surrounding Bud Light has moved away from beer and the conversation has become divisive and Bud Light really doesn’t belong there,” said Anheuser-Busch CEO Brendan Whitworth to CBS Mornings in an interview that aired on June 28. “Bud Light should be all about bringing people together”—as long as trans people aren’t invited, of course.
The company had sent Dylan Mulvaney ONE BEER with her face on it to celebrate the anniversary of her transition. Like Helen of Troy, it was the face that launched a thousand s***posts. Conservatives’ mouths were foaming more than Bud Light on draft, and sales of the beer dropped by over 25%. “Just to be clear, it was a gift, and it was one can. But for us, as we look to the future and we look to moving forward, we have to understand the impact that it’s had,” Whitworth continued in the interview. Evidently, he is trying to clean up the conservative fallout from the decision and beg beer-bellied bigots across the county to continue to patronize his brand.
Ironically enough, conservatives were just as disappointed with Anheuser Busch’s Twitter statement, for all of the wrong reasons. Bigots swarmed the comments section of the post demanding that Bud Light apologize for promoting “transgenderism” and beg for forgiveness, ironically, they said one thing that I actually agree with, which is that the Anheuser-Busch statement somehow used 1000 words to say nothing at all. The agreement stops there, considering that the words that these beer goblins would have liked to hear from Anheuser-Busch don’t deserve to be repeated here.
“One thing that I’d love to make extremely clear,” Whitworth continued in the interview, “is that impact is my responsibility, and as the CEO, everything we do here, I’m accountable for.” When asked if, in retrospect, he would have sent the beer to Dylan Mulvaney, he refused to answer directly. “There’s a big social conversation taking place right now and big brands are right in the middle of it,” he said. “For us, what we need to understand is, deeply understand and appreciate, is the consumer and what they want, what they care about and what they expect from big brands.” In other words, no, he wouldn’t have, but he’s also afraid to say that.
Bafflingly, Whitworth attempted to paint Bud Light as an ally to the LGBTQ community. “Bud Light has supported LGBTQ since 1998, so that’s 25 years.” Bud Light began as a brand in 1875, so I’m to understand that it spent the first 123 years of its life in ambivalent towards the community until it became socially acceptable to support them. My guy, queer people have been around since people existed. Your 25 years out of the 148 years you’ve existed don’t really count for much, feel me?
He continued,
“As we’ve said from the beginning, we’ll continue to support the communities and organizations that we’ve supported for decades. But as we move forward, we want to focus on what we do best, which is brewing great beer for everyone, listening to our consumers, being humble in listening to them, making sure we do right by our employees, take care and support our partners and ultimately, make an impact in the communities that we serve.”
I think what Whitworth means to say is that he will be “listening” to his conservative customers and letting all of the gay people fall by the wayside where they belong, because money is more important to him.
(featured image: Rob Carr/Getty Images)
