'Bud Lighted': Target is latest to face boycott calls over support for the LGBTQ+ community

Pride Month hasn’t officially begun but corporate brands from Bud Light to Target are already taking fire over marketing and merchandise celebrating the LGBTQ community.

Called “Bud Lighting,” the strategy is to crush so-called rainbow capitalism by branding companies as “woke” and calling for boycotts over everything from Adidas’ gender-inclusive swimwear to a North Face marketing campaign featuring drag queen and environmentalist Pattie Gonia.

After critics posted videos of attacking LGBTQ Pride displays and confronting employees in Target stores, the company held an emergency meeting and decided to remove or relocate some Pride merchandise so it’s less visible in stores.

Emboldened by Target’s decision, conservatives are piling on. In some cases, they are unearthing marketing campaigns that are years old, such as a Jack Daniels’ campaign featuring drag performers from RuPaul’s Drag Race, with the goal of stopping rainbow capitalism. 

What is 'BudLighting'?

“The goal is to make ‘pride’ toxic for brands,” one conservative activist tweeted. “Our campaign is making progress. Let’s keep it going.”

Target’s website carries hundreds of Pride products, including T-shirts, books and furnishings. Pride Month begins in June.

What is 'tuck friendly' swimwear? Abprallen?

At issue was misinformation spread about “tuck friendly” swimsuits that allow trans women who have not had gender-affirming operations to conceal male genitals. Some social media accounts falsely claimed the swimsuits were being sold in children’s sizes.

Conservatives also seized on Target’s partnership with Abprallen, which they claimed features Satanist designs. Target sells an Abprallen sweatshirt with a snake that says: "Cure transphobia, not trans people." 

Target removes some Pride Month merchandise, relocates displays

Even in the face of threats against store staffers, Target’s move after a decade of supporting and making profits from the LGBTQ community during Pride Month could damage the brand, according to consumer psychologist Ross Steinman.

“It’s hard to dispute that decision from a public safety perspective but from a branding perspective, it has the potential to be quite damaging,” said Steinman, a professor at Widener University. 

Will Target decision have a chilling effect?

What’s more, Target’s position could have a broader chilling effect, according to Steinman. 

Last week Target CEO Brian Cornell credited his company’s diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives for “much of our growth over the last nine years.”

“When you walk into a store and you feel at home, and it represents the community, it makes a huge difference,” Cornell told Fortune’s Leadership Next podcast.

“We will see more of the same if a brand like Target does not put its hands up and say: Enough,” Steinman said. “They are a major player and other brands look to them for their response.”

DeSantis, conservatives legislate against transgender people

Hundreds of bills targeting LGBTQ people – particularly transgender people – have been introduced by Republican lawmakers in statehouses across the country, seeking to regulate what bathrooms they can use, what medical care they can receive and what sports teams they can play on.

Prominent figures in the GOP like Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis have elevated these issues such as gender-transition care for minors as he embarks on his presidential campaign. 

Why culture wars are coming to Target store aisles

The trouble began in April when trans influencer Dylan Mulvaney posted a video to her Instagram account promoting a Bud Light March Madness contest that featured a photo of a Bud Light tallboy with Mulvaney's face on it. 

BudLight CEO Brendan Whitworth responded to the resulting backlash in a statement: “We never intended to be part of a discussion that divides people. We are in the business of bringing people together over a beer.” 

Now the culture wars are being fought in store aisles.

On Twitter, California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, criticized Target’s CEO, accusing him of “selling out the LGBTQ+ community to extremists.”

LGBTQ groups condemn responses from Target, Bud Light

LGBTQ groups condemned Target for its action. Nearly half of adults around the globe − 47% − support companies and brands that promote equality for LGBTQ+ people, according to Ipsos. Seven in 10 U.S. LGBTQ+ adults are more likely to patronize a business that "outreaches and advertises to the LGTBQ+ community," Community Marketing Insights found.

LGBTQ groups also condemned other corporations for bowing to pressure.

Last week, the Human Rights Campaign, the nation's largest LGBTQ advocacy group, took action against Anheuser-Busch over its handling of the conservative backlash to Mulvaney, accusing the multinational beer company of caving to political pressure.

In a May 9 letter shared exclusively with USA TODAY, the Human Rights Campaign informed the Bud Light maker that it has suspended its Corporate Equality Index score – a tool that scores companies on their policies for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and queer employees.

“Anti-LGBTQ violence and hate should not be winning in America, but it will continue to until corporate leaders step up as heroes for their LGBTQ employees and consumers and do not cave to fringe activists calling for censorship," Sarah Kate Ellis, president and CEO of GLAAD, said in a statement Tuesday.