Chicago gay bars boycott Bud Light as brewer shuns Dylan Mulvaney

Here’s mud in their eye.

Five Chicago gay bars are boycotting Anheuser-Busch for distancing itself from transgender social media star Dylan Mulvaney after her Arpil 1 collaboration drew conservatives’ ire and calls for a Bud Light boycott.

Sidetrack Bar in Chicago’s Lakeview neighborhood shared its boycott plan on Instagram, noting the brewer’s moves “strongly bring into question their support of the LGBTQ+ community.”

“For 41 years Sidetrack has encouraged liquor and beer companies that have wished to garner the LGBTQ+ customer base to actively support our community,” the bar’s statement said.

“Bud Light’s recent decision to drop the Dylan Mulvaney campaign, to put on ‘leave’ those who created it, as well as the statement by its CEO, wrongfully validates the position that it is acceptable to acquiesce to the demands of those who do not support the Trans community and wish to erase LGBTQ+ visibility,” it said.

The popular TikTok influencer and actress has over 10 million followers.

The bar said its Anheuser-Busch boycott would continue until the brewer “can clearly demonstrate that they will not acquiesce to the voices of hate that wish to erase LGBTQ+ existence.”

2Bears Tavern Group, which owns four bars in Chicago, also announced their establishments would no longer serve Anheuser-Busch products because of the brewer’s “anti-transgender actions and statements.”

In its announcement on Instagram, the group dragged the statement offered by Anheuser-Busch CEO Brendan Whitworth amid the controversy.

“Its CEO’s statement, in which he all but erased transgender people in favor of anti-trans vitriol, was cruel and hurtful. CEO Brendan Whitworth’s excuse that Anheuser-Busch ‘never intended to be part of a discussion that divides people’ was tantamount to saying that the rights and safety of transgender people are topics worthy of debate.”

“They are not,” the group declared.

Busch distributors around the US have been feeling the fallout, with many bars in more conservative states now refusing to stock Bud Light. 

The $132 billion beer company’s market value plummet by some $5 billion since the campaign was launched April 1. 

The company had previously defended its decision to hire Mulvaney before its CEO caved to incensed conservatives, offering a flat apology, saying: “We are in the business of bringing people together over a beer.”

It’s unclear whether any New York City bars have also decided to boycott Anheuser-Busch, but in 2021 the famed Stonewall Inn poured Bud Light down its drains in response to the brand’s owner donating thousands of dollars to conservative lawmakers who backed anti-transgender legislation, according to Reuters.