Who actually has the power in a capitalist and free market economy? Quite clearly it’s us as consumers. Even something – as here – as trivial as an ad for a beer can lead the capitalists, the producers, losing substantial amounts of money. Billions off the market capitalisation in fact. And all just because some of us consumers decide to switch where and how we’d like to spend our money.
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Samizdata quote of the day – ‘Get Woke Go Broke’ really is a thingSamizdata Illuminatus (Arkham, Massachusetts) · Culture Wars · Economics, Business & Globalization · Slogans & Quotations August 6th, 2023 |
 38 comments to Samizdata quote of the day – ‘Get Woke Go Broke’ really is a thing |
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I used to use Costa Coffee. No longer.Because of their ‘woke’ advertising that includes body mutilation in favour of trans matters.
A complication with boycotts is these brands are owned by huge parent companies who can easily survive boycotts. Costa is owned by the coca cola company for example. So you boycott Costa? They have hundreds of other products and brands. Do you boycott all them? Then look at who the biggest owners of Coca cola company are – Berkshire Hathaway, BlackRock, Vanguard….very difficult to boycott everything these groups control.
Look at online book sales too…. Amazon conveniently also control abebooks!
I will add that I’m in favour of boycotts. We just need to be aware that these huge corporations are good at arranging things so that if you refuse to give your money to them for one brand, they’ll squeeze it out of you with another brand.
It is trite, but important, to note that were are not in a capitalist and free market economy, and us as consumers may well avoid one product, but the corporation may get some cheap fiat money (e.g. by quantitative easing and selling bonds to the central bank) which will keep the ghastly Zombie company sated and the bonuses flowing. However, every little step helps.
Martin hit the nail square on the head. It’s nearly impossible to make a boycott work when the company is owned by a larger company who also owns a rival brand. Boycott Bud over Dylan Mulvaney? Great, but Bud is owned by InBev who also owns 400 other brands. Boycott Disney? Great, they also own ABC, ESPN, and God only knows whatever other media outlets.
I’m really at the point where I think maybe companies shouldn’t be allowed to buy and sell other companies. Break them all up like they are monopolies or something.
Another brand you regularly hear understandable calls to boycott is Ben and Jerry’s. But the brand is owned by megacorporation Unilever. Look at all the brands Unilever own. If you want to really stick it to Ben and Jerry’s you’d advocate a total boycott of Unilever. But in developed countries it’s likely very difficult, costly and time consuming to seriously boycott Unilever. As they’re so huge they don’t really give much of a damn some people hate one of their ice cream brands!
There’s also the problem that so.many corporations have almost ideological uniformity on many issues. Take all the Pride washing by these companies. If you boycotted every company engaging in this you will most likely be almost as effectively excluding yourself from the modern economy as being de-banked would do.
As Mr Ed has already pointed out, we are light years from a free market economy – we are in a Cantillon Effect economy (named after Richard Cantillon who wrote about such things three centuries ago) where Credit Money concentrates economic power in a few hands – I doubt will be seeing BlackRock and the Wall Street banks go bankrupt this side of the collapse of this system.
The political culture is also corrupted – with even supposedly Conservative publications, such as the Wall Street Journal, supporting blatantly rigged elections – such as in Arizona in 2022 (so much for “it is just going to be done against Trump – when the establishment get rid of him, we will go back to honest elections”).
An economic system that means endless Credit Money for the Corporate elite, at the expense of everyone else, and a political system that depends on rigged elections, is not acceptable.
“But honest elections might mean the election of Populists, and that might threaten the endless Credit Money for the international Corporations” – the population might question why certain people get the Credit Money first (and at lower interest rates) – or even why the Credit Money exists at all.
I do NOT support Major Douglas and the other “monetary cranks” – but at least they wanted everyone treated the same with the money-created-from-nothing, not endless sweetheart deals for a Corporate elite.
The emerging international Corporate State (the dream of Henri Saint-Simon two centuries ago) supports Digital Currency – with people being “Nudged” into spending on certain products – and the “money” (which will not be gold or silver – or any physical commodity) having to be spent in a certain amount of time.
Otherwise the population might be “Transphobic” and not spend on what the elite decide they should spend on. And if anyone says this is tyranny, the international elite will just trot out the heirs of Hobbes, Hume and Bentham – to say that Free Will does not exist (if Free Will does not exist the international elite can not be violating it) and say that humans are not beings, that we are just machines.
Not really, Unilever does not run them directly, B&J has its own management. If they start costing more than they are worth, Unilever will either demand changes or sell them.
IIRC, the boycott of Bud Lite led to the rise of Modelo Especial as the new “most popular beer in the US”, it being the next-most-watered beer in production.
Modelo Especial is owned, in a complex chain, by A-B, the owner of Bud Lite.
It is always worth boycotting a brand, because it will hurt the people who own it eventually, even if they own a dozen others.
There are thousands of beer brands worldwide. Almost all of them are better than the guff InBev sells. Even random ones in 3rd world countries, with bits in…
This a moment for doing what we can to the trees even if the forest won’t suffer a thing. It was marketing execs at Bud Light who made that decision, not the Chairman of Inbev. It was the management of Costa that created that ad campaign, not the head of Coca Cola. The boycott might get only a few execs fired or demoted, but a few observers in those companies or the industry might learn a lesson. Chins up, everyone!
Boycotts work in that they cause bad publicity and loss of income to the particular woke brand, even if they don’t affect the parent megacorp. However they are also a good opportunity to review what you buy and who you buy it from. As we are discovering, many industrially produced edible substances sold as ‘food’ in our supermarkets are not very good for us, being designed for profit rather than nutrition, so we should educate ourselves about what we’re buying and slowly change our shopping preferences.
“Unilever will either demand changes or sell Ben and Jerry’s” – that depends on who owns and who controls Unilever (that can be different people) – I doubt that there is a Mr Unilever who owns the enterprise and makes management decisions.
Even if we assume that the share owners are in charge, a rather wild assumption, most shares these days are under the control of institutions (BlackRock and so on) – due to tax law (which hits individuals and families), regulations, and Credit Money (the Cantillon Effect again).
There may still be some interest in profits (although are not profits “racist”, “White Christian Nationalism” [invented by the FBI], “transphobic” and an insult to Gaia?), but the emerging system will tell people what to spend “their money” on anyway – so “reasonable profit” for the international “Partner” corporations will be built-in – until the system collapses.
Short version – Corporatism is not Capitalism. Such people as Prime Minister Gladstone and President Grover Cleveland would not accept the present system (let alone what is being created) as having anything to do with the society they defended.
The real test of “go woke – go broke” will be the Disney Corporation, no other Corporation has shown such fanatical hatred (yes hatred) for its customers – if Disney goes bust (goes bankrupt) then some scrap of capitalism still remains – liberty has not yet been totally destroyed.
Contrary to popular myth, there actually is such a thing as “a good American beer”. And thus, the real tragedy of the Bud Lite boycott is it was a golden opportunity for USA to switch to one of those, such as Yuengling, rather than just a different sex-in-a-canoe beer. Alas, it was not to be.
Indeed, there are some quite nice local African beers.
I appreciate that many firms are owned by larger corporations. But a boycott hurts the small firm and sends a message to the larger firm – so if you boycott Ben and Jerry’s (for example) you are reducing the contribution of Ben and Jerry’s to Unilever and sending a message that woke posturing is unwelcome (and therefore unprofitable).
I currently avoid Walkers Crisps (because of Garry Lineker), will avoid Costa Coffee, Ben and Jerry’s, Bud Lite (because I avoid such beer anyway), and any film that is wokeified. I have also dropped a subscription to New Scientist and no longer read Scientific American because they have dropped reporting on science in favour of reporting science gossip with woke posturing.
The thing about boycotts is they are pretty ineffective if you are doing by yourself. A particular brand has to piss off a significant section of the public before they find that they have a problem. I do agree that a particular brand is still affected even if people are switching to a different brand that is owned by the same company.
One potential positive of boycotts is that even if a right-wing boycott doesn’t work against the targeted company, if it causes progressives to rally around the brand in reaction, this has some propaganda merit in puncturing the left’s self-image and rhetoric. Seeing them increasingly simp for billionaires and defending companies that may also have terrible workplace conditions, poor pay, etc, at the same time hopefully will reduce their credibility.
I know that plural of anecdote is not data, but from my local grocery store in rural West Virginia, Bud Light can’t be given away. I’m sure there are still some who buy it, but when the Independence Day weekend rolled around Bud Light (and most of the other Bud brands) were the only things on shelves even with the ridiculous rebates and instant savings attached. The American Legion has a BL banner in the window that has been there forever they use for announcements (e.g. special nights, which band is there, sales) and it’s covered up entirely by hand made signs now. The biggest problem is the limited selection at the grocery store and the way
the laws are set up to supposedly separate the brewer, distributor, and seller of beer but in reality don’t and allow the distributor to essentially rent so many feet of shelving in a store for their products alone. It’s a messed up remnant of Prohibition that somehow is supposed to protect consumers or something. So in most grocery stores from coast-to-coast you find 2/3 of the shelf space devoted to the big brands not because they are in demand but because those brands write a check to the grocery store and the little guys to vie for what’s left.
If I have to buy beer, my go-to is Yuengling, but I rarely buy beer because I homebrew. I even have the set up to keg it and run it through my kegerator.
I’m doing my part to bring a multi-billion dollar a year transnational megacorporation down!
To quote the great Charlie Papazian, the man who essentially introduced homebrewing to the masses and has done more to promote homebrewing than anyone else since Carrie Nation, “relax, don’t worry, and have a homebrew!”
First, I agree with Perry, there are some excellent beers for sale in the US, and I’d suggest, if you are here, to support local businesses by buying from some of the small microbrews.
Nonetheless, all this talk of boycott makes me queasy. I don’t buy Bud Lite (aside from the fact that it sucks) simply because they got in my face and insulted me. I’m not part of some political movement. I’m an individualist — make your own decisions and take it from there. Boycotts make me think of unions and strikes, and organizing labor. If you don’t like your job — quit and get a better one. Boycotts to me are what liberals do, libertarians just make consumer choices.
The whole boycott thing smacks of “they don’t share my values”. But that is in a sense the very thing I object to. I shouldn’t have to care one iota about the values of some corporation. In fact the only value a corporation should have is to make money for their shareholders within the bounds of the law — that is what they were created for. So to “boycott” to me is to buy into the the very premise we object to — that corporations have social values. Of course, if you get up in my face with your nonsense, then I’m going to say f**k you, and buy something else. Otherwise, I don’t care, and I’m certainly not organizing a political movement about it.
I wasn’t advocating any kind of organised boycotts. The cases with Budweiser, and Gillette before them, is that they pissed off their customer base with their incredibly poorly targeted advertising. People didn’t band together to decide not to buy their stuff they did it on mass as individuals.
That is frankly idiotic and that kind of thinking is why i have repulse to huge chunk of bizarre libertarians ideas about what is the world. Vaunting live and let live then we have this deterministic stance:
First: other people don’t think like you. Second: Profit is not only measurable in Money.
—-
Boycotts matter and should be done, but we should not expect them to be the only weapon, and sometimes will not work. The important is to not despair and get creative.
If you don’t tell histories your values don’t exist.
Contrary to the mantra that History is written by winners the truth is instead that History is written by those that write it.
The winners of Cold War did not tell its History.
This attitude would explain why ‘liberals’ (ie establishment centre-left) effectively control most major corporations and other institutions, while libertarians have negligible influence.
Maybe you should tell all these managers and shareholders who clearly don’t agree with you. They clearly think their companies should have social values and feel it is appropriate to use their economic power and influence to propagate such values.
I’m unsure why corporations can’t have values too. We would expect other institutions to have some sort of values. We’d like the military to have martial and patriotic values for example. Religious institutions will surely reflect some values. I could see how maybe a widget company might be able to have no values outside the profit motive. However, while they both may be run for a profit, I think a pornography company on one hand and then a Christian publishing company will very like have different ‘values’.
If it’s legitimate for corporations to organise campaigns to encourage people to buy their products and services (ie advertising), why is it illegitimate for people to organise campaigns to try to encourage people to not buy certain products and services?
Whether one likes it or not, we live in a political society. You can choose to not engage in the political but it is effectively universal disarmament. Others will fill the vacuum. You may be want to be left alone. Modern liberalism is universalistic and hegemonic. Its proponents will never leave people alone. They won’t let you opt out.You may be able to make an individualist protest against them but good luck thinking that’ll learn them.
@lucklucky
Vaunting live and let live
The opposite of live and let live is “I get to decide what you can and can’t do”. Are you advocating for that? “Live and let live” IS something that should be vaunted, in fact it should be the core principle of a healthy society.
First: other people don’t think like you. Second: Profit is not only measurable in Money.
In a sense it doesn’t matter what other people thing, the simple fact is that the large majority of corporations ARE started for the purpose of making money for the shareholders. In America the majority of people think that the government can fix climate change, but that doesn’t make it true.
And I’m afraid you are incorrect, money is very specifically the mechanism for measuring profit in a free market. Not necessarily immediate money, but long term money. That is, after all, the purpose of money — the measurement of value. (To be pedantic, we don’t live in a free market so their are a lot of caveats that go with this.)
To be completely fair there are some corporations that are started for other purposes — charities for example, or even some commercial corporations, Ben and Jerry’s, or a workers co-op like Woodman’s grocery store, for example — that might have had other goals in mind than just money. But that is not at all true for the large majority of corporations. If people wish to do good then they take the money they earn and use it for that purpose.
Boycotts matter and should be done
What is the difference between a boycott and consumers just making free choices? The difference is the former has an associated organization.
The problem with boycotts is that they transform from one cause into a broader political agenda, often one very much opposed to “live and let live”. I compared it to unions — the basic idea of unions is one I am kind of on board with — people pooling their power to collectively bargain for better wages and employment rights. But look at what they quickly become — mechanisms for the political ambitions of their leaders, often meaning a hard left agenda. What is causing most of our problems — and the fact that the voters have lost their freaking minds — is that the unions captured the school system and have been indoctrinating our kids for forty years. There is an argument that teachers should collectively bargain for better employment situations, I don’t actually agree with it, but lets assume it ad arguendum. Somehow that political movement, created for good ends, turned into the death knell of liberalism (real liberalism) in America.
Look at black lives matter. I can get on board with the initial goals of demanding police accountability for the unjustified killing of black kids. But light the fuse and look where you end up.
And, FWIW, if you actually think that the boycott of Bud Light is going to make a damn bit of difference, you are mistaken. FFS, the CEO hasn’t even lost his job despite not only his mistake in allowing it to happen, but his ongoing clusterf**k of a response. As usual, the only people hurt by this are the guys at the bottom.
If there is a real point to the anti-woke-boycott impulse, it is that it provides a rallying cry for the tribe, and it can hold out specific results and give hope to the hopeless.
It’s not that it’s a movement without a point – the fact of the movement itself becomes the point.
There will be no social change resulting from Bud Lite’s losses – but there may be some change resulting from people seeing some tribal “success.”
Boycott is a team sport, while libertarianism isn’t, so libs aren’t enamored of the idea.
That is precisely the point, Progressives don’t want to let you live unless you agree with them. So what do you do? You put your head in sand like most libertarians in all historical situations. Libertarians did not defeated the Soviet Union, from their actions even if they were the large majority Soviet Union would still exist…
“The problem with boycotts is that they transform from one cause into a broader political agenda, often one very much opposed to “live and let live”.
Do you know what means reciprocity, retaliation? In war there is no live and let live to those that don’t let you live. You live and let live those that respect you.
Such inflexibility of thinking such difficulty to see more than Dogma.
Power is profit. Power is to engineer the battlefield favourable to you. To do what you want you need power not only money.
Social recognition in their culture/circle is profit now in high exponent acceleration due to the huge increase in social competition due to Internet instantaneity.
Aren’t Libertarians favourable to free association? seems not, some appear to feel in such high horse that a free association is something horrible that taints their reflection in the mirror.
lucklucky:
My position is, go for it if you want to, it’s just not for me, which I think well serves both legs of the right to associate (or not.)
Besides, I last had a Bud Lite in 1975, by accident, when I was drunk. (Maybe I actually started this boycott many years ago and it’s just now caught on?!)
“There is an argument that teachers should collectively bargain for better employment situations…”
It would appear that teachers’ unions are failing at this part of their job. I know a few teachers, most of them seem to want to change jobs and do something else because their working conditions are so completely awful.
@Stonyground
It would appear that teachers’ unions are failing at this part of their job.
Right, this is exactly the point. When a “good thing” (such as improving the lot of teachers) gets taken over by an “organization” it quickly morphs away from promoting the “good thing” to promoting the organization. The “good thing” quickly become merely a pretext, a window dressing, for the true cause — advancing the profit and power of the organization and its leaders. And quickly the “good thing” trans morphs into something that is harmful to the people who originated it all.
BLM and trans rights are examples where the transformation was breathtakingly quick. I’m afraid the NRA is a little bit like that too, though certainly only a LITTLE bit, and don’t get me started on the ACLU. My God, I used to send them money.
Libertarians are indeed in favor of free association, and it does make sense to unite together in common cause sometimes. But surely they are very wary of the “organization” and the danger it poses, especially when the issue is really politics or something closely related to politics. The truth is that libertarians like me are basically anarchists that somebody and taken aside and talked a little sense into.
I co-wrote a couple of briefs for them. Imagine MY shame.
@bobby b
I co-wrote a couple of briefs for them. Imagine MY shame.
LOL, for sure. But let’s remember that they used to be a really great organization. They were the ones who, for example, though pretty lefty themselves, understood the central nature of free speech that they defended the right of Nazis to march through mostly Jewish Skokie. It is a shameful tragedy that such an honorable and great organization has been reduced to this pitiful, parody of itself.
I don’t doubt that the briefs you wrote advocated for the ideals of the old ACLU and not the new.
Gene and Perry almost say what I think. The point of a boycott is to kick a division president in the tender bits and get her fired, in order to serve as a warning to the presidents of Megacorp’s 346 other brands.
Think of it as the ‘Agency Problem’, but sorta reversed.
Be nice to think it might happen.
Fraser Orr wrote:
The NRA has been coopted for a long, long time. They backed gun control legislation at both the state and federal levels going back to the 1930s, tried to stop gun owners suing, told Reagan to sign the FOPA in 1986 even after the Hughes Amendment was jammed into it by telling Reagan they would fight it in the courts and then did nothing, fought against gun owners suing for their rights, helped Manchin write his thankfully shot down legislation, and basically has gone out of its way to do nothing beyond suck up to politicians and ask for money. As it is now, the NRA is little more than a way for Wayne LaPierre to get a ton of money.
I detest Trump’s treatment of Bump Stocks, not because of the Bump Stock, but because of his cavalier “take the guns first, worry about Due Process later” attitude, and it was that attitude of dismissing Due Process that caused me to not vote for him in 2020 (indeed, I’m done voting for the lesser of two evils so unless someone comes along that I want to actually vote for instead of pulling the lever to vote against, I’m just done voting), but at least he publicly defanged the NRA when he told Congress on national TV they no longer needed to be afraid of the NRA.
The sooner the NRA is dead, the better it will be for gun owners.
Steven R
so unless someone comes along that I want to actually vote for instead of pulling the lever to vote against, I’m just done voting
You might want to check out Ramaswamy. I have been very impressed with him. When was the last time you heard a serious presidential contender explain his detailed plan for firing 75% of the federal workforce, and shutting down the ATF, the FBI, the DOE and a few other alphabet agencies.
It is very, very unlikely he could win, but the chance is not zero.
Perry is correct – one of the good things of recent years is the growth of the Craft Beer industry, both in Britain and the United States. Individual or family owned business enterprises.
Even depressed people like me have to admit that not everything is getting worse.