New Watchdog Tool Puts Power Back Into the Community

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Created: Monday, May 03 2021 09:31

For over a year now, California state leaders have been calling for alcohol deregulation, framing it as an emergency measure to keep bars and restaurants afloat. Now, as the state slowly claws its way out of the pandemic-induced chaos, legislators are trying to make these "emergency" measures permanent. These "regulatory relief" policies--including app-based delivery of cocktails, service area pushed out into public space, and vastly expanded bar footprints--have one intention: to increase the amount of alcohol consumed in California.

This is a reckless and craven appeal to Big Alcohol lobbyists, and utterly unconcerned with the harms that befall the public. But the community has always had a way to talk back, by registering complaints about alcohol bars, restaurants, and stores to the California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control (ABC). However, many residents are not aware they have this power and right. To help directly connect our neighbors to ABC, Alcohol Justice has created the ABC Online Complaint Portal. This portal allows anyone to submit a complaint directly to ABC.

In addition, we have compiled a Field Guide to Regulatory Relief. Designed to work hand-in-hand with the complaint portal, the Field Guide lets residents know their experiences are not just pet peeves--they are real violations of the obligations alcohol-selling businesses have to be good neighbors.

We know what harms arise from uncontrolled alcohol sales. As alcohol taxes and regulations are slashed across the country, we are experiencing a spike in every indicator of alcohol overuse. Fatal liver disease has been on the rise for 20 years; alcohol use disorder for 30. California has seen steady increases in fatal DUIs, and reviews of death certificates find a 50% increase in the rate of alcohol-related deaths since 1999. Alcohol-related mortality is the major cause of preventable deaths among adolescents, being a deciding factor in motor vehicle crashes, homicides, and suicides.

Yet, as a California resident, you do not need to have witnessed death to have a right to complain about a venue. Noise, litter, violence or threatening behavior from patrons, reckless outdoor alcohol advertising, disregard for laws regarding sales to minors or minors on the premises--these are all good reasons to file a complaint using our portal. Complaints can be anonymous, or you can leave your name if you would like ABC to follow up with you.

This is not even a matter of taking the power back. The power has always been yours. Despite what many in the legislature would have us believe, selling alcohol is a privilege, not a right. Those who embrace it have an obligation to look after their patrons and communities, not just their bottom lines.

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Budweiser’s Out-of-Bounds Cynicism

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Created: Monday, March 22 2021 09:00

For many, the Super Bowl is the pinnacle—of athletic competition, of advertising, of alcohol consumption. This year, main sponsor Anheuser-Busch InBev (ABI) climbed a new peak by exploiting the global pandemic for alcohol sales and lying to the public, in a true hail mary of #COVIDwashing.

The multinational beer giant ran an advertisement prior to the Super Bowl touting Budweiser’s intention to donate all of its ad space to vaccine awareness. And this was true, technically. All of the ad time that might have been used to sell Budweiser instead ran public service announcements trying to encourage viewers to get the COVID-19 vaccine when it became available.

What ABI failed to mention, however, was that the donation applied only to the Budweiser brand. The brewer giant ran ads for four other brands it owns: Bud Light, Bud Light Hard Seltzer, Michelob Ultra, and Michelob Light Organic Seltzer. Make no mistake, Budweiser is not the most popular beer in America. That title belongs to Bud Light, and ABI had no intention of losing a dollar of that dominance. Meanwhile, the Budweiser ad spot donation was covered in the New York Times, the Washington Post, Fox News, CNN, MSNBC… which is the kind of exposure money just can‘t buy.

We have seen this pattern of behavior from Big Alcohol many times in the past. Breast Cancer Action coined the term “pinkwashing” to refer companies whose products are linked to breast cancer participating in breast cancer-related charities. Alcohol Justice has been using a similar term, COVIDwashing, in homage, when Big Alcohol uses lockdowns and COVID-19 awareness campaigns to market its products and make the companies look benevolent. But much like alcohol has a clear link to breast cancer risk, it may be linked to COVID mortality as well.

Physiologically, alcohol both impairs the immune system and causes inflammation. A weakened immune system makes individuals more likely to contract COVID-19 if exposed, while the fatal reactions to the virus mostly derive from excessive lung inflammation and congestion. Socially, alcohol inspires more reckless behavior, while bars and nightclubs, as enclosed spaces where people tend to congregate very close together, threaten to become loci for spread.

This is not to say there was no way ABI could ethically support COVID-19 awareness and prevention. The company could have donated the money it spent on advertising—including the money it spent on advertising its intention to donate—to groups fighting to save lives. At the very least, it could have not lied to the public’s face, and donated all of its ad time. But given the opportunity to do the right thing, ABI instead banked on the power of #COVIDwashing, letting the public’s gratitude overshadow the corporate cynicism. It is just the latest in a long line of ethical collapse by ABI, and yet another reason to Free Our Sports and get Bud out of the Super Bowl.

WATCH the Youth For Justice and Alcohol Justice crews take down Budweiser’s two-faced charity.
LISTEN to Prevention Action Alliance’s J.P. Dorval explain how kids can learn to read between the lines of Super Bowl ads.

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