A micro beer brewery based in the Netherlands has been forced to change its “sexist” label after a female employee decided she didn’t like their new beer.
Amsterdam’s Oedipus Brewing, which prides on its diversity, issued a lengthy explanation why the brewery decided to change the label of one of its beers. “We aim to be an open minded, all-inclusive and positive brewery. Our goal has always been to challenge stereotypes. Beer doesn’t have a gender, beer is about flavor. Beer certainly doesn’t care if you are a boy or a girl, or anything in between.”
The statement continued: “We were perplexed when one of our bartenders expressed her dislike of the label of Mata Hari — a saison with gin spices that we made in collaboration with Gigantic Brewing.” According to the company, a female employee said “I do not feel comfortable selling this. I think it is sexist.”
The “sexist” label featured a gigantic cartoon naked woman adored by small white characters bowing down to her. The cartoon, apparently, “incited the infamous bier & tieten (‘beer & tits’) motto.”
Oedipus Brewing said that “it slipped our mind that an artistic expression could be sexist” and put the label “under close examination” to understand “what exactly is problematic about this label.”
The brewery claims that despite ideas of gender equality slowly changing, the beer industry is “still largely dominated by men,” thus the label confirms “stereotypical notions and may even stimulate sexism, without wanting to.”
It added: “By visualizing the woman in a sensual pose emphasizing her naked body, the woman becomes objectified, as if the essence of womanhood is in the body. And as if it is the body that needs to be hailed.
“The female figure becomes even more objectified when imagining a male consumer drinking from the bottle—her body.”