Previously: 40 Years in Beer (Book II) Part 50: Papazian goes AWOL as we contest AB’s aggression against Budvar.
Around the same time in 1994 that I began risking charges of treason and apostasy by publicly questioning Charlie Papazian, inquiring whether Papazian had any intention of at least pretending to be an actual leader (and, even 30 years later, my own intention is to never let him forget his evasiveness), a book called Tastes of Paradise: A Social History of Spices, Stimulants, and Intoxicants came to my attention.
Substitute “mass-produced American low-calorie ‘light’ lagers” for “goods” in this passage from the book, and you’ll understand why I was so enthralled.
Goods are being produced for ever-faster consumption in ever-greater quantities. They lose in “substance or content,” but that is replaced by the external “packaging.” The actual quality, for instance, the taste of a thing, no longer counts, but rather what would have to be called the illusion or image of the thing is what matters. Things no longer speak for themselves. From now on, advertisements define what a thing is. Ads create a world of illusions, within which things are assigned their new place, their new meaning, and the new rituals that surround them. The advertisement for a given product encompasses not only its “promotion,” but also “recruitment” and “solicitation,” and in the broad sense the whole culture industry (is) part of this advertising and publicity.
The book’s author was Wolfgang Schivelbusch (1941 – 2023), who was not a Groucho Marx character from Duck Soup, but a very real German-born cultural historian operating from “the perch of an adroit and amiable Marxist sociology,” as Publishers Weekly once phrased it.
Tastes of Paradise dates to 1980 in the original German, and in 2024 I’m still consulting it with frequency. It is neither long nor “heavy,” and boasts thoughtful essays on coffee, chocolate, tea, tobacco, hashish, opium and alcoholic beverages. Taken together, these have the effect of guiding readers from the Middle Ages through contemporary times, with the focal point being sociology, not pharmacology.
Schivelbusch depicts beer as a pre-industrial, communal and organic beverage, reflecting the pastoral ethos of the countryside, and inexorably grounded by nature’s limitations on the maximum alcoholic strength likely to be attained through simple, traditional techniques of fermentation.
Distillation was a concept brought to Europe by the learned Arabs, who used the process in chemical experiments, also providing a means of concentrating the strength of alcohol as a beverage, subsequently wreaking havoc on human beings unaccustomed to the potency of distilled spirits – or to living conditions in their new, oppressively squalid urban industrial slums.
Consequently cheap gin became the crack cocaine, meth and opioid of its day, all rolled into one, offering pain relief and liquid escape during the scarce hours between ceaseless shifts at the factory, which in turn yielded just enough cash (or credit at the company store) to begin the punishing cycle anew.
Schivelbusch makes it clear that while alcohol has been subject to abuse since the beginning of time, temperance movements as we know them today came into being only when liquor became inexpensive, common and widely ingested.
In the end, liquor’s debilitating tendencies became too much even for the exploitative robber barons, who formerly had deployed the liquid as pacifier. Reversing course, the accumulators of capital abruptly forged an unholy alliance with religious fundamentalism.
As a local example, by the late 1800s my city of New Albany’s much-lionized plate glass magnate, Washington C. DePauw, was providing financial support for the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU), and the latter happily agitated for the complete prohibition of alcoholic beverages, either when on the clock or off of it.
New Albany’s branch of the WCTU operated from the cozy confines of its downtown reading room, located in a long-demolished house that occupied the space where NABC’s Bank Street Brewhouse once operated, then Monnik Brewing, and now Dog Haus Biergarten.
Circa 2013. I’d like to think that each pint consumed there since 2009 has helped pay back the WCTU for the atrocity of Prohibition.
At a later stage of this narrative, I’ll return to Schivelbusch to explain how he unwittingly foresaw the advent of “solipsistic craft beer narcissism,” as I term it; as a hint: it helps to understand the medieval spice trade’s true significance.
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However we’re not there quite yet. Returning to Anheuser Busch versus Budvar in 1994, and the F.O.S.S.I.L.S. mailer, I’d heard nothing from Papazian. Admittedly, I’d given him little time to reply. I was tired; business was good, and I was planning a complicated trip to Switzerland, Albania and Spain with hotels, planes, trains, chauffeured vehicles and probably an oxcart somewhere for good measure.
In my mind, we’d get back to the Budvar crusade after vacation, but then two things happened in short order, as both CAMRA and Papazian answered the call. I’d harbored few expectations, which made CAMRA’s snarky but positive mention of us in What’s Brewing all the more delightful; meanwhile, Papazian stayed true to himself and lapsed into legalistic gibberish (sorry, Budvar; you deserved better).
The following passages are as they appeared in Walking the Dog (albeit lightly edited). My analysis of Papazian’s turn as “slippery eel meets Neville Chamberlain” is first.
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ESCALATION IN BRITAIN, APPEASEMENT IN COLORADO
(Walking the Dog #45 & 46, June/July, 1994)
Charlie Papazian to FOSSILS: I Don’t Know, I Can’t Help, and Don’t Quote Me on That
First, the good news, I am pleased to report that the front-page mock quote in the May edition of Walking the Dog was premature.
Charlie Papazian, President of the Association of Brewers, legendary and revered homebrewing guru and longtime proponent of the American Homebrewers Association’s mantra “Relax. Don’t Worry. Have a Homebrew” has finally spoken, responding to the second of two letters from FOSSILS urging him to take part in our campaign of opposition to Anheuser-Busch’s bid for a stake in the Czech Budvar brewery.
However, I am not pleased to report that Papazian’s response will not be seen in this space. His long-awaited letter of May 4 concluded with the explicit wish that no portion of it be published. My attorney has advised me that if I were to publish the letter in spite of Papazian’s wish legal action could be taken against me for doing so.
All I can do is paraphrase the text of Papazian’s response, copies of which will be made available for viewing at Rich O’s Public House by those FOSSILS club members who reside in the New Albany area.
Paraphrased Summary of Charlie Papazian’s Letter to FOSSILS.
Papazian acknowledges the opportunity to state his views on the A-B and Budvar situation, but he doesn’t know all the factors relating to it and thus declines to join the FOSSILS club’s effort. He does not rule out a future position, which would depend on him gathering more information. Papazian reiterates his advocacy of quality beer and the right of beer drinkers to choose, and he expresses support for whichever route Budvar elects to take in the future to preserve quality beer. He closes with the firm expression of his desire that no portion of his letter be published.
I am reminded of an anecdote in Ball Four, Jim Bouton’s seminal account of the realities of major league baseball. Bouton tells the story of his boyhood fascination with the big league stars of the 1950s. Bouton’s favorite player was Alvin Dark*, and in the well-documented manner of American boys, he idolized Dark. Finally, after a game in New York, the future Yankee pitcher got the chance to meet his idol. Bouton asked Dark for his autograph, and Dark refused, responding, “take a hike, son.”
Bouton was devastated, but the encounter taught him a valuable lesson about life and the difference between the mystique surrounding our heroes and their real flesh and blood lives. Just as Bouton got over it, I’ll – we’ll – get over it.
But not without a rebuttal.
Papazian’s Position Examined.
There are three main points in Papazian’s letter. First, he states that he cannot form an opinion because he doesn’t know all the facts relating to the Anheuser-Busch/Budvar situation. Second, he defends beer quality, consumers’ choice, and the right of Budvar to do what it must to maintain quality and choice. Third, he expresses his desire that no portion of his letter sees its way into print.
As for Papazian’s plea that his lack of knowledge about the situation precludes forming an opinion, the obvious rejoinder is, “Charlie, why not get the information and learn?
Is this information available? Of course, it is. Anheuser-Busch will send information detailing its side of the story to anyone who calls St Louis, and FOSSILS has endeavored to present the opposite side of the story, drawing on CAMRA sources and others.
However, with regard to A-B’s plans for a “partnership” with Budvar, all the information necessary to reach a conclusion as to the future of the projected marriage amounts to twelve fluid ounces, the amount of American Budweiser in an aluminum can, which if consumed even without the comparative yardstick of Budvar, one of the world’s foremost lager beers, is sufficient to predict what will happen to Budvar or any other brewery that comes under the control of A-B.
Does Papazian really need to be reminded that the calculated banality and olfactory futility of the beer brewed by America’s megabrewers are precisely the factors that have propelled the rise in homebrewing and the heightening of beer consciousness in America?
These, in turn, are the factors that have made possible the homebrewing and beer appreciation establishment, built and presided over by people just like Charlie Papazian.
As for Papazian’s defense of quality and choice, does he really think that these words are sufficiently elastic to embrace Anheuser-Busch’s motives in the case of Budvar?
Anheuser-Busch is spending vast sums of money in an attempt to obtain a stake in Budvar, not because the American megabrewer is even remotely interested in advancing the art and science of beer and brewing, but because it is interested in obtaining a favorable business advantage by resolving the trademark dispute with Budvar.
Furthermore, a stake in Budvar will enable A-B to establish a distribution bridgehead in the Czech Republic, a centrally-located in low-wage nation, from which the American megabrewer can unleash on Europe the very same mass-market propaganda that has enabled it to become the biggest player in the American swill market.
If Papazian feels it is appropriate to use words like “quality” and “choice” to describe the cultural holocaust that the noble and high-minded Busch clan is about to unleash in the traditional heartland of European brewing, does he also believe that Miller Lite is a “fine pilsner beer”?
Fowl Feces Revisited, Glorified, and Codified.
Charlie Papazian’s credentials as a homebrewer and a tireless advocate of the best that beer can be are beyond dispute. Consider what he has accomplished! If there were a Mount Rushmore for homebrewing pioneers, Papazian’s familiar, bearded profile would be there.
Papazian has garnered an immense stockpile of credibility, both personally and in the form of the Association of Brewers and the American Homebrewers Association, organizations that he built and nurtured into the closest thing that America has to a focal point for beer enthusiasm.
But what good are these resources – the books and educational materials, zymurgy, the competitions and programs, the festivals – and the many thousands of participating homebrewers and beer enthusiasts, if all of it and all of them cannot be mobilized, deployed and inspired to defend the very philosophical principles that are the foundation of it all?
Among these principles are certain value judgements pertaining to beer, and the most basic is the recognition that there has to be something else – something better – than the norm, which in this instance can be symbolized by Budweiser, as brewed by Anheuser-Busch. It is this first, fundamental value judgement that leads to everything else that follows: drinking imports instead of megabrewed swill, turning to microbrews as an alternative to imports, and (or) homebrewing as an alternative to any or all the proceeding.
One cannot relax and have a homebrewer and have a home brew until one has reached the stage of wanting to drink a home brew, and to reach this stage is to reject, implicitly or explicitly, beers like Budweiser. The philosophical foundation of beer enthusiasm in America, beginning in the 1970s and leading to the present, is built from a value judgement that rejects inadequate beer and advocates for good beer. The positive advocacy of what is “right” cannot exist without some idea of what is wrong, and the vast majority of American beer enthusiasts understand this and permit their palates to prove it on a daily basis, even if they do not espouse the revolution as openly as I do.
To put it simply, Budvar symbolizes what is right in the world of beer, and Anheuser-Busch symbolizes what is wrong. I think Charlie Papazian knows this, but for some reason he is afraid to be quoted about it even as he straddles the fence and eloquently denies knowing anything about a topic that is, after all, his life’s work. This is a sad, sad day in the still embryonic history of beer enthusiasm in America.
It is also a sad day for the American Homebrewers Association. The AHA’s isolation and lack of direction in the A-B/Budvar controversy exposes the fatal weaknesses in its (and Papazian’s) oft-chanted philosophy of relax, don’t worry and have a homebrew.
Yes, this is a timeless, beautiful and entirely correct attitude for approaching the art and science of homebrewing, and had CAMRA embraced this philosophy in the early 1970s, commercially-brewed real ale would be a quaint memory in Britain today.
There is a time to relax, and there is a time to stand up for one’s principles. The “Relax” mantra can now be seen in it true light, as the historical successor to the phenomenon like the Vichy regime in wartime France (Relax. Don’t Worry. Collaborate), as well as other gradualist schools of thought that counsel acceptance of the status quo in a dynamic situation, or that otherwise refuse to exercise leadership or take responsibility.
I think there is much more at stake here than the refusal of our national organization and its leadership to take a position on Anheuser Busch’s indefensible aggression in the Czech Republic.
At some point, the AOB and the AHA must recognize the desire on the part of many members, both individuals and organizations, to transform the increasing presence and clout of America’s beer enthusiasts into political power to achieve worthy goals that cannot be achieved by a policy of relaxation.
Conceivably, these goals might include lobbying in support of a more rational regulatory regime and a higher profile advocacy of responsible consumption in the context of good, true, real beer. Since the marketing and advertising strategies of America’s megabrewers are to blame for so many of the repugnant aspects of American beer drinking culture – a mess that we must clean up as we remake the American-beer drinking ethos – it isn’t unreasonable to suggest that the defense of Budvar is the perfect place to begin, lest the aesthetic contamination of the American swillocracy be unleashed in the heartland of lager brewing.
Charlie Papazian, are you listening?
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While Papazian twisted himself into a pretzel with his caterwauling, my CAMRA heroes used my polemic to buttress their polemic, and I’ve never been any prouder to be quoted.
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ESCALATION IN BRITAIN, APPEASEMENT IN COLORADO
(Walking the Dog #45 & 46, June/July, 1994)
FOSSILS Recognized Abroad … “Not All Americans Like Mr. Busch’s Beer”
FOSSILS Effort Noted in CAMRA’s What’s Brewing
Reprinted from “Counting the Ants,” a column by P. A. Newton, as it appeared in the May, 1994 issue of What’s Brewing, the newspaper of Britain’s Campaign for Real Ale.
The first part of Newton’s column explains that Keiko, the Orca whale that starred in the movie “Free Willy,” is still in captivity. Indirectly, this fact provides ammo for those needing “another reason to hate Anheuser Busch, brewers (sic) of Yankee Bud and busting a beechwood chip to get their hands on the Czech Budvar,” because 90% of the world’s captive Orcas are owned by none other than August Bush III through A-B’s ownership of Sea World parks. Newton concludes, “remember Keiko next time you buy a Bud, not that you would … ”
Then, under the heading “Brewery Molester,” Newton continues:
Not all Americans like Mr. Busch’s beer. FOSSILS, the Fermenters of Special Southern Indiana Libations Society, is so outraged by A-B’s bid to buy Budvar that it has organized a petition to the brewing giant and has let rip at its advertising policy in the Czech Republic.
“Quite simply, Anheuser-Busch’s pious promises to the people of the Czech Republic, sterile platitudes regarding quality and glowing descriptions of the company’s place in the hearts and minds of Americans would make master propagandist Joseph Goebbels blush with envy.
“We know that Anheuser-Busch has done more than any other American brewery to build and maintain a swillocracy by gutting the essence of beers as beer was meant to be – and as beer is still made in places like České Budějovice, home of the targeted Budvar brewery.
“We know that Anheuser-Busch cannot be trusted – not now, not ever, never.
“We know that Budvar needs Anheuser-Busch’s help about as much as your neighborhood day care center needs the help of a convicted child molester.”
Give those colonials their independence immediately!
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By decade’s end I had attended three Great American Beer Festivals in Denver, Colorado. These enormous spectacles supposedly originated with tubs of beer in the beds of pickup trucks parked in Papazian’s back yard (or some like-minded foundational myth), and during this period he was at his zenith, a ubiquitous presence at the sessions.
While there, I strongly suspected there would be an opportunity to introduce myself, and in due course it came, although I don’t remember the year when it happened.
Noting that I’m 6’ 4”, and probably weighed 265 lbs. at the time, Papazian threw back his head and looked up at me as if I were an airplane in the sky (he was slim, trim and of average height), saying “I thought you were shorter.”
Our brief chat was cellar temperature, but cordial. Maybe Amy had better luck.
Interestingly, in 2012 Papazian was still “in charge” of the movement (specifically the Brewers Association, successor to the Association of Brewers) and he helped devise the “craft versus crafty” public relations campaign, which sought to educate consumers about “faux craft” beer like Blue Moon (SAB Miller’s name appears nowhere on the label) and Goose Island, which had been fully absorbed by AB InBev and was no longer independent in any meaningful sense of the term.
Ironically, Papazian and the BA experienced a surprising backlash; the rising generation of “solipsistic craft beer narcissists” (remember them?) which tattooed Bourbon County Stout on their ass cheek as a sort of secret handshake, really didn’t want to be told that their money was going to boost a multinational corporation’s stock prices, as opposed to a father and son brewing team in Chicago who needed to sell bottles to make their brewhouse mortgage payment.
And I supported Papazian … though not without a resounding “I told ya so, Charlie.”
Next: 40 Years in Beer (Book II) Part 52: “Anheuser-Busch, Gone Home,” our classic 1997 victory lap.
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* I, too, met Alvin Dark.
It was probably 1978, in New Albany, at (of all things) a prayer breakfast, which attended solely to collect an autograph from Dark, who by then was a former manager of the Oakland Athletics (my favorite team).
Unlike Bouton, I got Dark’s autograph. I wonder where it is now?
