Opinion

How A Single Can Of Beer Woke America Up To The Real Woke Agenda

   DailyWire.com
LANDOVER, MD - OCTOBER 06: A fan holds up a can of Bud Light during a game between the New England Patriots and Washington Redskins at FedExField on October 6, 2019 in Landover, Maryland. (Photo by
Patrick McDermott/Getty Images

Anheuser-Busch said it best in a letter directed toward customers and distributors.

“This was one single can given to one social media influencer,” the letter said. “It was not made for production or sale to the general public. This can is not a formal campaign or advertisement.”

“Anheuser-Busch did not intend to create controversy or make a political statement,” the letter read. “In reality, the Bud Light can posted by a social media influencer that sparked all the conversation was provided by an outside agency without Anheuser-Busch management awareness or approval.”

That was back at the beginning of May. But even in this crazy world where things come and go at the speed of light, this story, as the phrase goes, had legs.

By the middle of May, Bud Light was still feeling the heavy pain of the marketing disaster (which has gotta knock the “New Coke” campaign out of the top slot). Sales by volume are down 29.5% for the week ending May 20 compared to last year, and total sales are down 25.7% for revenue compared to the same time window, data from Bump Williams Consulting and Nielsen IQ provided to Newsweek shows.

Anheuser-Busch had clearly alienated its traditional blue-collar, barbecue-and-ball-game base by partnering with Dylan Mulvaney, featuring the transgender influencer on a custom-made single can sent to Mulvaney. But this has been going on for two months now and the outrage still hasn’t dissipated. There doesn’t appear to be any end in sight.

I’ve never understood why actors or musicians play politics. Why would Bruce Springsteen — whose base of fans is even more blue-collar than Bud Light drinkers — even come out in support of Hillary Clinton, as he did in 2016? Why alienate half of America — and in Bruce’s case, a majority of your fans?

But it won’t stop. Tomorrow (June 1) is the beginning of “Pride Month,” in which all 320 million Americans are supposed to contemplate all things gay (plus those other 81 genders out there, too). Companies will be falling over each other to show how truly and deeply tolerant they are.

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Anheuser-Busch’s blunder is truly the best example out there of “go woke, go broke.” Still, it doesn’t seem to be resonating with other major companies (pay attention here, Target). Even after Bud Light’s blunder, Target has kicked off a whole line of gay pride apparel, The North Face featured a drag queen in its “Summer of Pride” campaign, and the L.A. Dodgers invited the gay and trans “nuns” called the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence.

Americans, though, don’t want that. They’ll buy your product, but they don’t care about your stance on transgender people. Anheuser-Busch is learning this lesson the hard way. For some reason, Americans have hit the wall on having the whole LGBTQ+ agenda shoved down their throats.

Like anchorman Howard Beale in the 1976 film “Network,” they declared in one unified voice: “I’m mad as hell, and I’m not going to take it anymore!”

That’s how a single can of beer woke America up to the real woke agenda.

The views expressed in this piece are the author’s own and do not necessarily represent those of The Daily Wire.

Joseph Curl has covered politics for 35 years, including 12 years as White House correspondent for a national newspaper. He was also the a.m. editor of the Drudge Report for four years. Send tips to [email protected] and follow him on Twitter @josephcurl.

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