Brands and their related consumption behavior have become one of the battlegrounds of the culture wars tearing the United States apart.
Now right-wing conservatives have started boycotting brands to pressure big companies to reduce the visibility of sexual and gender minorities.
Recently, Anheuser-Busch InBev (AB InBev), one of the world’s largest brewing companies, has experienced the force of boycotts. In the spring, its American company collaborated with a social media influencer and an actor Dylan Mulvaney with in advertising Bud Light beer.
26-year-old Mulvaney is a trans woman who has documented her transition on social media. He has a total of several million followers on Tiktok and Instagram. In October he discussed In the White House, the President Joe Biden with the rights of trans people.
Mulvaney has collaborated with several brands. He has advertised, for example, Nike sportswear for women.
Anheuser-Busch had sent Mulvaney a special can of Bud Light with a picture of his face on it. Mulvaney drank beer and showed off the can in a video he uploaded to Instagram.
– This month I celebrated my 365th day of womanhood and Bud Light sent me perhaps the best gift ever, a can with my face on it, Mulvaney said in the video.
The ad made the singer gun to sing
Conservatives were outraged by the ad. Many right-leaning celebrities took to social media to urge people to avoid buying and drinking Bud Light.
For example, a singer Kid Rock posted a video of him shooting Bud Light cans with a shotgun and sniffing for Anheuser-Busch. A video created with the help of artificial intelligence has also spread on social media, in which a supposed trans woman who resembles and sounds like President Biden advertises Bud Light.
The boycott quickly took off. Sales of Bud Light, which was one of the most popular beer brands in the United States, have now collapsed by almost 25 percent compared to the same time last year, says New York Post. According to the magazine, sales of Anheuser-Busch’s other beers have also begun to decline.
The violent reactions stem from the fact that the rights of transgender people in the United States is a deeply divisive issue.
Published by the Pew Research Center last year research according to 38 percent of Americans felt that society has gone too far in accepting transgender people. In the opinion of 36 percent, society had not done enough in this matter.
For example, the participation of trans women in women’s sports competitions and the hormone treatments of minors have caused fierce controversy.
The actions of the beer bosses angered the minorities
In mid-April, Anheuser-Busch’s US CEO Brendan Whitworth said in a statement on Twitter that the company’s intention was not to engage in a conversation that divides people.
– We are in a business whose goal is to bring people together over a beer, Whitworth said.
At the beginning of May, Whitworth’s boss, the CEO of AB InBev, a brewing giant operating from Belgium Michel Doukeris tried to downplay the company’s cooperation with Mulvaney in the investor call.
– We need to clarify the fact that it was one can, one influencer and one post, not a campaign, Doukeris said Fox News by.
Anheuser-Busch has announced that in the future it plans to focus its marketing on music and sports, says The New York Times. The company also aims to appeal to patriotic feelings by sponsoring a veterans’ organization for the first time.
Next, organizations and activists representing sexual and gender minorities were angered by the brewing company’s actions.
Whitworth’s statement did not sit well with them because the CEO did not express support for Mulvaney or condemn the transphobic speech made during the beer commercial.
For example, in Chicago, several gay bars stopped selling Bud Light and other Anheuser-Busch products, says a Chicago online magazine Block Club Chicago. The bar owners said in their release that the incident proves how little the brewing company cares about the LGBTQIA+ community.
In May, the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), the largest organization defending the rights of sexual and gender minorities in the United States, suspended Anheuser-Busch’s equality and inclusion rating because, in the organization’s opinion, the company had handled the aftermath of the scandal poorly.
According to HRC, Anheuser-Busch no longer has the right to use the “best jobs” honor. Previously, HRC had given the brewing company top marks.
At the end of April, for example, the organization had called on the brewing company to publish a press release expressing its support for Dylan Mulvaney and its transgender customers, shareholders and employees.
According to HRC, Anheuser-Busch did not respond to requests. A member of the organization’s management team Eric Bloem told the AP news agency that Anheuser-Busch’s actions during the uproar have been a textbook example of how not to act in a crisis.
The department store chain feared the fate of the beer brand
This week, conservatives have found a new boycott target, the second largest discount department store chain in the United States, Target.
The Pride products sold by the chain have come under harsh criticism.
According to Target, customers in some stores have thrown Pride products on the ground, approached salespeople in anger, and shared threatening videos on social media that were filmed in the chain’s stores.
The shopping chain reacted by removing some Pride products from sale and moving the Pride products to less visible places in some of the chain’s department stores.
– Due to unstable conditions, we are making changes to our plans. We are removing products that have been at the center of the confrontation, Target said in a press release on Tuesday, according to AP.
The company did not say which products exactly it removed from the selections.
Women’s swimsuits have caused the most irritation, with a feature that allows trans women who have not undergone gender reassignment surgery to hide their genitalia.
In addition, satanism-themed LGBTQ clothing and accessories from the British company Abprallen sold by Target have come under criticism.
Pride products went on sale at the beginning of May in Target department stores. Pride month is held in the United States in June, which celebrates the human rights of sexual and gender minorities.
Sources: AP, Reuters