Bud Light Backlash Was Always Bigger Than Dylan Mulvaney | Bobby Burack

Dylan Mulvaney feigned ignorance on Monday during an appearance on "The View," during which the transgender TikToker discussed the backlash to Mulvaney's partnership with Bud Light in 2023.

"Well, I will start by saying I love beer, and I always have," Mulvaney said to the ladies on set. "So, I mean, when I took that deal, I didn't think anything of it, because I was, like, ‘Oh, this is perfect.’ It felt like an organic thing to do, and it was just another part of me."

But the partnership wasn't organic.

What's often misinterpreted regarding the backlash toward Bud Light was the origin of the response. The beer maker plastered Mulvaney's face on a can not because he "likes beer" but to celebrate his "365 days of girlhood."

Why is someone identifying as the opposite gender for an entire year worth celebrating? Participating in transgenderism is not heroic or valiant. Nor is expressing any form of sexual identity or preference. That's the knock on Pride Month, a month that celebrates various forms of homosexuality.

As a nation, we should celebrate heroes and accomplishments. Liking the same sex or identifying as a different gender is neither.

Honoring homosexuality and/or a year of transition (as Bud Light did) inherently sends a message of superiority. Impressionable children and even depressed adults, and there are both of many, see those celebrations as alternative means of happiness.

And beer brands should not be in the business of doing that. Nor should any person or corporation that's not well versed in the consequences of gender transition. 

Anheuser-Busch marketing official takes leave of absence after Dylan Mulvaney/Bud Light disaster.

While promoting Mulvaney's year-long dedication to girlhood, was Bud Light aware of the increased suicidal contemplation rates (45%) or side effects of post-surgical transition? 

Was Bud Light aware that the mainstreaming of transgenderism started around 2016 when the Human Rights Campaign (HRC), the nation's most powerful gay rights lobby, sought another group to fundraise around following the Supreme Court ruling Obergefell vs. Hodges, which forced all 50 states to recognize same-sex marriage?

The other side of the story is worth telling. As is just staying out of sexual identity altogether and focusing on producing beer.

Accusations of transphobia by critics of the Bud Light boycott, like the ladies on "The View," were only running interference with the conversation. To them, normalizing gender change is a political opportunity, no different from keeping racism alive in America.

The most ghoulish part of the entire equation is that the groups celebrating gender transition are not trans. The corporations, talk shows, politicians, and lobbyists keep trying to exploit the trans community for clout, financial and political gain. Yet they are not the ones who bear the mental and physical consequences of a complete transition. The trans people who fall for the messaging – the messaging Bud Light tried to spread – do. 

Either way, the CEO of Anheuser-Busch, a straight guy named Brendan Whitworth, will be fine.

The backlash to Bud Light was always more of a rejection of the brand's foray into gender activism than a rejection of Dylan Mulvaney.  Most beer drinkers didn't even know who Mulvaney was before the partnership. Rather, they were all too familiar with the point Bud Light was trying to make by releasing a can featuring his face.