The Bud Light Boycott and the Sad Future of Online Protest

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One of the wonderful and unfortunate realities of TikTok’s stitch feature is that you are often subjected to the same video over and over. I’ve seen more reactions to “white lady lights spaghetti on fire” than I can count. This week, that echo came in the form of a person in jeans, boots, a blue-gray T-shirt, and a white baseball cap driving over a can of Bud Light in a pickup truck. The original TikTok never showed up in my feeds, but the reactions came in droves. “[Anheuser-Busch] literally did the bare minimum to recognize a marginalized community, and you’re having a fucking heart attack,” went one. “How blessed are you that this is the biggest problem you face?” Another pointed out that the truck used to drive over that Bud Light was a Chevy, which is made by General Motors, a company that, like Anheuser-Busch, supports LGBTQ+ rights. 

All of the fuss started earlier this month, when Budweiser partnered with trans TikTok star Dylan Mulvaney, who got on Instagram dressed as Holly Golightly from Breakfast at Tiffany’s and drank a Bud while talking about March Madness. While that may not be cause for alarm in many circles, conservatives began to protest. Kid Rock shot up a few cases of the lager on Instagram. An influencer known as Conservative Dad launched his own “Ultra Right” beer. Country star Travis Tritt tweeted a promise to remove Anheuser-Busch products from his tour rider. Others followed Rock’s example, destroying or dumping out Bud Light and several other related brews to express how upset they were that Bud Light had partnered with a trans person. 

This is arguably a trend within a trend. Ever since Fox News’ Tucker Carlson went in on the evolving sexiness of M&M’s, calling a company’s actions “woke” has become a go-to method for conservatives to disparage an organization’s attempts at inclusivity. They may not understand the word’s meaning or origin, but the message seems to have gotten through that if you call someone or something by that term, you’re sure to ignite a backlash. And then a backlash to the backlash. 

This, then, is the latest iteration. Although reactions and @-replies and response videos have been tools in public debate for decades now, the rise of TikTok as the square of public discourse—and, relatedly, the disintegration of Twitter—has changed the tenor of how these debates play out. Whereas people mostly yell at each other in text, GIF, or (occasionally) video form on Twitter, TikTok’s tools allow for a “let’s roll the tape” approach that lets users show an offending image and then comment on it or refute it with oral arguments, videos, photos, and other images. The same thing could happen in a Twitter thread—and has—but there, everyone can chime in at the same place. On TikTok, further commentary spins off into an infinite loop of stitches and reactions. 

Online commentary has always been a sprawling and unruly thing, but what’s made the Bud Light controversy—and I use this term loosely—so fascinating to watch is that now, three weeks out, the conversation isn’t even about Bud Light and Mulvaney anymore. Not really. Instead, people are pointing out that the beer brands people are switching to, like Coors, also support LGBTQ+ people, or discussing which brewer is making Ultra Right beer. They’re talking about whether the boycott will have any long-term impact on Anheuser-Busch’s bottom line or rejuvenate the brand—and whether boycotts even work at all, given similar efforts against Nike (for its support of Colin Kaepernick) and Disney (for also supporting LGBTQ+ issues). It’s become about the business of debate itself. 

Which, OK, fine. Maybe there’s a place for that. But when a debate about a beer company supporting a marginalized community goes on for nearly a month, it’s eye-catching that the conversation is no longer about the marginalized community in question. Anti-trans rhetoric is everywhere, and if people want to destroy a lager because its parent company sent someone a few cans and some well-wishes, perhaps it’s time to talk about why.