Splicetoday

Politics & Media
Jun 29, 2023, 06:27AM

Beer Beef

As a social conservative, I take more issue with Bud Light’s attempts to win people back than the original controversy.

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Bud Light is trying to win back the customers it alienated due to its Dylan Mulvaney controversy earlier this spring. The beer, owned by Anheuser-Busch, gave the man, who identifies as a woman, with a custom pack of beers featuring Mulvaney's face on them, coupled with a positive letter.

Many conservatives weren’t happy. As a result, sales are down 25 percent. Bud Light has taken action; its recently-released "Easy to Summer" 60-second ad features what appears to be Americans enjoying their summer. It includes old white guys, dogs, and cookouts. As a conservative, that should appeal to me. True Americana.

However, as a social conservative, I take more issue with Bud Light’s attempts to win people back than the original controversy. Anheuser-Busch is a multi-billion dollar company. Woke capitalism is nothing new for such entities. I don’t support it and reject the concept of transgenderism. A man can’t become a woman or vice versa. We should acknowledge that while also treating people who may suffer from mental health issues like body dysmorphia and gender dysphoria compassionately. Such people often suffer from depression and anxiety. Society and the state must do more to improve people's mental health. But what won’t help people's mental health? More alcohol consumption. One of the antidotes to improving societal mental health would be finding ways to reduce substance abuse. Yet, Bud Light wants to do the opposite; it wants more people to consume its product.

A broad scientific consensus says that children who see more ads for alcohol, on television, the internet, on billboards, or in stores, are not only more likely to become underage drinkers but problem drinkers later in life, according to the National Library of Medicine. It means, at least for younger people, these ads result in increased consumption.

About 17 percent of the adult population reports binge drinking. People may think of liver damage, DUIs, car crashes, and the 140,000 premature deaths it causes each year as the chief problems with alcohol consumption in America. Those are serious, but the issues stem far beyond them. Alcohol fuels violence, including domestic violence. It also leads to self-harm; alcoholics are more likely to commit suicide, and one-fourth of suicides involve alcohol. Excessive alcohol consumption results in more risky sexual behavior. It includes casual sex without contraception (or misusing contraception), from both men and women, which results in more sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancies. Unwanted pregnancies result in unborn babies killed via abortions. Whether you're pro-life or not, it’s not a good situation. It also hurts unborn children in the womb and can cause birth defects.

Alcohol is objectively bad for people’s mental health. It worsens problems like depression and anxiety long-term. And even that temporary good feeling is not true for everyone; some people are pricks when they drink. Americans live in one of the fattest countries in the world, and alcohol makes us fatter. Not only does it have calories people may not otherwise consume, but it also slows our ability to burn fat and makes us hungry.

There’s the opioid epidemic. More than 100,000 Americans die of drug overdose deaths per year. While nearly all of these deaths involve fentanyl, and some cocaine, alcohol was present with more than one-quarter of such deaths in Massachusetts in 2022. Not only does it cause the type of poor decision-making that leads to people doing dangerous drugs, but it also contributes to prescription opioid misuse. I've learned that many people who die of drug overdoses never intended to do fentanyl. But nowadays, people cut cocaine with fentanyl. Familiar with some upper-middle-class white guys, I know that drunk people sometimes do cocaine. I know more people who occasionally blow lines than I care to admit, though I’m not one of them.

There is also the fiscal angle. The Centers for Disease Control says excessive alcohol consumption costs the country $249 billion annually, and taxpayers foot two-fifths of that ($100 billion). These alcohol ads are dangerous if you’re trying to cut back or quit. Alcohol is the last thing they want to think about. Yet, its promotion is everywhere.

Discussion
  • The Massachusetts Puritan weighs in once again

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  • Me personally? The worst thing is some fat white pricks getting all riled up over a fucking beer can, so upset that they lash out at A.B. corp. I'm perfectly straight, and I have studied some genetics. If a kid can be born with six fingers, or a defective heart (me), or blind, what the fuck makes people think that "trans" can't happen? What's next for those ignorants? Gay and lesbians? Make your fucking beer and make your millions and shut the fuck up.

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  • Calm down, man, before you blow a gasket.

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  • And what does it matter if you're "perfectly straight, " whatever the hell that's supposed to mean? Stop being ridiculous.

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  • Personally I never understood the furor that some conservatives had over having Dylan Mulvaney on a Bud light can to the point where they would run over cans of Bud light with their 4X4s or use the cans for target practice. Whatever floats your boat I guess... I also never got the whole Bud light Dylan Mulvaney campaign in the first place. Other than being a small time stage performer and self obsessed trans influencer what exactly is so prominent about this person that they should be elevated to the level of having their face put on a beer can. If a persons face is going to be put on a beer can one would hope that there would be some form of accomplishment or something impressive about that person that would justify such an honor regardless of whether they are gay, straight or trans.. If your primary claim to fame is having a self absorbed emphasis on your own gender identify which appears to be the case with Dylan Mulvaney then that seems to me to be not very impressive at all as narcissism is rarely impressive.

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  • It was one six-pack custom made for Mulvaney.

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  • one can of beer actually. Dylan released a statement today about the brew-haha, breaking silence on the issue. My opinion as the queer Senior Editor of this website is that once again I am disgusted but not surprised to see yet another transphobic piece misgendering Dylan. Judge wouldn't be crying about mental health and alcoholism if Budweiser was running ads with a straight white male celebrity. Budweiser ghosting their ad partner made them look like shit and was just as much the reason for their financial impact as rednecks buying beer just to shoot it up. And by the way it's also transphobic to call Dylan a narcissist when that title could be applied to scores of other celebrities who live their lives online. Dylan has documented her transition and received attention for it but also received death threats and unending bullying. Perpetuating that with misgendering, gaslighting, projection and plain old deflection (abortion, really?) is middle school bullying behavior bullshit. Live and let live, lest anyone think the lady doth protest too much and get the wrong idea about why you're so bothered by the gender identity or sexuality of others..

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  • I'm not sure which Judge (judge?) you're referring to.

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  • But I must say, it was pretty cheap of Bud Light to give Mulvaney just one can instead of a six pack. I consider that more transphobic than calling Ms. Mulvaney a narcissist, which appears to be true, death threats and other celeb narcissists notwithstanding.

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  • It is not transphobic to call a person who behaves narcissistically a narcissist. it is simply making an observational statement. One definition of narcissism is "excessive preoccupation with or admiration of oneself". That is a fairly accurate description of Dylan Mulvaney as well as many celebrities and online personalities and influencers..

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  • Sorry, wrote Judge instead of Joyce by mistake (Freudian slip). It’s not transphobic to call someone a narcissist, it’s transphobic to call a person who identifies as a woman a male.

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