Buy Or Don’t Buy

Keepin’ it classy, ladies!

One of this week’s major headlines is the sale of Anheuser-Busch to Belgian beer company InBev. InBev currently produces Stella Artois, Hoegaarden, and my personal favorite, Staropramen. In this video from CNN.com, reporter Susan Roesgen poses the question, “Could the king of beers be knocked off the throne by a company headquartered in Belgium?”

Um…yes. Have any of these people actually consumed Budweiser? It’s cold Clydesdale piss with the aftertaste of low-brow Super Bowl marketing.

Nonetheless, loyal Bud fans are freaking the fuck out. Also from CNN.com:

Philip McClary was grilling out at his home in suburban St. Louis, Missouri, on Sunday night when he heard hometown brewer Anheuser-Busch would be bought by the Belgian company InBev.

“I was actually drinking a Bud Light when I heard, and I couldn’t even finish it. That’s the honest-to-God truth,” he said Monday.

“I was proud to drink Budweiser, not any more,” said P.J. Champion, a student at the University of Mississippi who said the brew is “a great piece of American history.”

Well, P.J., I’m glad you take pride in something that a) you had no part in creating and b) actually originated in Germany. But seriously - if the Belgians could do anything to change the flavor of Bud, they’d be doing us all a big favor.

Fortunately for all the rednecks out there, they’re not going to. Regardless of quality, Budweiser is the bestselling beer in the United States. They’ve been producing it for over 100 years, and fans are familiar with its taste and iconography. Why would InBev buy them out and then run them into the ground by messing with success?

My point here is (obviously) not that we should boycott Budweiser because it will soon be in foreign hands. I’m willing to bet that there’s a high correlation between Bud drinkers and Walmart shoppers, and I don’t see them up in arms about “corporate responsibility” when they’re out buying a $40 lawnmower that was assembled by blind Vietnamese children. And anyway, any cutbacks that InBev makes were inevitable - Anheuser-Busch itself was cutting employee benefits in an attempt to avoid the buyout.

No - we should boycott Budweiser because it totally, totally sucks. If you want beer that tastes good, buy something Belgian, or Czech, or German. If you want an American beer that tastes good, buy a microbrew. If you don’t care about the taste, buy Natty Light - at least it’s cheaper.

Of course, maybe you should take everything I say with a grain of salt - even on the 4th of July, that holiest of American days, I was drinking Heineken.