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The Bud Light boycott continues. Anheuser-Busch is responding by sponsoring vet groups and commissioning ads that "will play heavily on themes such as football and country music". A glance at conservative comment sections reveals a few vocal consumers vowing that no amount of patriotic pandering will change their mind and that they will continue the boycott no matter what.
I am reminded of this apocryphical exchange between two Chinese officers late for battle:
That is to say, a proper incentive structure should not only contain costs for injecting woke politics into business but also rewards for backpedalling.
On the other hand, the undisputed champions of pushing business and people around do not seem too keen on accepting apology. Or do they? The bottom line seems to be: If your public kowtow is more valuable for the propagation of the movement than the display of your head on a spike, you may get another chance (unless and untilyou even slightly step out of line again).
This seems ideal because the incentives for the victim thus contain an effectiveness criterion. Mouthing platitudes is not enough, you need to actually further the cause of your attackers. The uncertainty ups the ante for the victim.
On the other other hand, woke shaming campaigns might not be the ideal blue print for convervatives, given their lack of clout and high-brow media capture.
You know, a part of me wants to go "Turnabout is fair play". Because all this woke capital bullshit has finally made me believe that there is no ethical consumption under capitalism. You should not give your money to people who hate you.
I always thought those phrases were just Marxist seethe and cope. Now I get it. Because it's palpable how much the present ruling regime in buearocacy and capital management hate me. The answer still isn't communism. The answer is to stop consooming. At least as much as you can. And try to support artisans who genuinely support your values where you can. Or buy used to deprive the company of income. I also feel no moral qualms about piracy of legacy IP when some new conglomerate buys it up and decides to hold it hostage and vandalize it, while beating me over the head with propaganda.
My immediate thought was "how would I buy used Bud Light? After it's passed through someone's bladder?" And then I thought "would I even notice a difference?"
/s
When I was a kid in the 80's and 90's, and beer brands seemed to be a more core part of the average American Male's identity, my father and our neighbor always got into light hearted spats about how shitty the other's beer choices were. My father always, and I mean always (as in died of a cirrhosed liver), drank Coors Light, and my neighbor drank Bud Light. One day, when I'm like 5 or 6 years old, my dad used me as a prop for a joke on my neighbor. In front of the neighbor, he asks me "Do you know how Bud Light is made?" I say "No" and he follows with, "They feed hops and water to cows, and they bottle up the piss". I honestly thought that was how Bud Light was made with the sincere naivety of a child for at least a year.
I had the opposite experience as a child when they told me that honey was basically bee spit and I refused to believe it, perhaps the first in many contrarian opinions I've held that didn't pan out.
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