Bud Light is very sorry.
The popular beer brand wants everyone to know that it does NOT espouse rape.
The unexpected issue recently came to light after Bud Light used its “Up For Whatever” marketing campaign to label its bottles with various phrase and taglines.
One of them reads:
The perfect beer for removing no from your vocabulary for the night.
And while this might appeal to Bill Cosby, it raised the ire of many who found such wording just a bit to… rape-y.
In response to the backlash, Alexander Lambrecht, Vice President of Bud Light at Anheuser-Busch, has issued the following statement:
"The Bud Light Up for Whatever campaign, now in its second year, has inspired millions of consumers to engage with our brand in a positive and light-hearted way.
"In this spirit, we created more than 140 different scroll messages intended to encourage spontaneous fun. It’s clear that this message missed the mark, and we regret it.
"We would never condone disrespectful or irresponsible behavior."
That’s good to know. And the unfortunate wording did lead to a handful of hilarious Tweets at least. Among our favorites:
- The irony here is that most people would only drink Bud Light against their will. (@thejasonmack)
- And up until this point Bud Light has shown nothing but good taste. (@Rschooley)
- As if Bud Light calling itself a beer wasn’t offensive enough, it’s now making a sales pitch out of date rape. (@BDStanley)
- People surprised that Bud Light would do something in bad taste must have never actually tried their beer. (@NotthatAdamWest)
Eh, we’d still consume Bud Light over any of these other products: