Obscenity in Beer
So, where does one go to find obscene beer, anyway?
Oh, I know…
Photo credit: theplainjane.com
…but, no. That’s no good. That’s in Massachusetts. Santa’s Butt is probably legal there. If I wanna stick it to the man— and avoid an undue four-hour commute to the beer store —I’d have to stay closer to home. A trip to the local grocery store would turn up exactly what I was looking for…
Be warned, Dear Reader, for you will most certainly find what follows objectionable.
Double Bag: Obscenity In the Beer Aisle
TwoGlasses Beer Archive says about Double Bag:
Double Bag is dark tan in color with a slightly- heavier- than- medium body. The taste is a hair to the hoppy side of dead center on the spectrum. In fact, “well balanced” is what best describes this beer. It’s got a fair amount going on, but everything seems to offset each other. The result is a flavor that hints at intensity but ultimately holds back, like the brewers didn’t want to risk offending you. This eager-to-please “play nice” personality would normally leave me unimpressed, but the knowledge that it’s being used to sneak ass-loads of alcohol into one’s system… well, I have to respect that.
That’s right, this stuff has an obscene amount of alcohol in it (7.2% !), flogging Santa’s Butt (at 6%) like a recalcitrant schoolgirl in a sexploitation flick. So, if you’re like me, and you pound a Double Bag every bit as enthusiastically as you would Santa’s Butt you’ll find you get much more bang for your hard-earned buck, in terms of hard-core inebriation action.
But this project isn’t about how-buzzed-how-early I felt Friday night. This project is about obscenity in beer labeling. So let’s take a closer look…
Not bought for the alcohol content, if you know what I mean.
If you have to ask, “Why Double Bag?” Then I have to wonder how you missed the connotation to the sexual slang ‘double bagger,’ (a sexual partner so aesthetically unendowed that two paper bags must be employed to soften their garish countenance — by obscuring it behind more than one layer of 30# recyclable brown paper,) as if this product, with it’s immense alcohol content, might better facilitate such carnal endeavors: the ultimate beer-goggles, if you will.
Even more obviously, I’d have to ask how you could have missed the exposed pair of enormous, pendulous teats that adorn this packaging.
Like Magellan once navigated Cape Horn, the Long Trail Brewing Company has done little more here than carefully circumnavigate the oppressive reach of the Maine Bureau of Liquor Enforcement in policing the alcohol labeling that reaches our shores store shelves.
Is this image really that much different than this? Or even this?
What message is the cow on the left sending to our impressionable youth who hang out in the beer aisle leering at the packaging? The demure, flustered glance over the shoulder, the hay dangling just so from the corners of her mouth— as well as the text hovering in the sky above the grain silo —all say “TAKE A HIKE,” but her tail says “come hither,” and stands poised to wipe away the sky-borne sentiment.
The cow on the right, with quivering pursed lips, and extended, yearning neck seems to have already allowed an off-camera suitor to reach first base. And by the foregone abandon implied in her posture, I’d say she’s going to be pitching strikes right down the middle of the plate all night.
Which is not to mention that which I will not go too deeply into here; which is the way in which this little piece of graphic design attempts to capitalize in areas where internet pornography has made strides and laid the groundwork for them: Everything from hay-rolling, innocent farmgirls, to horny lactating preggers porn, all the way down to the more vile genres of barnyard sex.
Clearly, this is the most obscene beer labeling out there. It exudes sex. It’s seething with it. And it’s the filthiest, dirtiest sex of all: drunken beer drinking sex.
PS: To the purveyors of decency in the Maine Bureau of Liquor Enforcement and Thought Police everywhere: You will never win. We shall not go quietly.
[Cross posted at: Braindead Shithead.]
Stump Lane 
yo double bag is the shit, 7.2%! being from NH I’ve got a steady supply. Although, your comment about the cow’s udders being reminiscent of tits, seems like a stretch if you ask me. having worked on a dairy farm i consider myself somewhat of an authority. as for your definition of “double bagging” i have never heard of it referencing multiple paper bags over the head. to double bag has always meant to wrap two condoms over ones member so as to add more protection, because you assume that your partner is most likely diseased or “dirty.” now why on earth would the good people of long trail ales want to associate themselves with that kind of mental imagery? well they wouldn’t. so just accept the simple fact that cows are a large part of vermont’s economy, and quit reading too much into advertising.
Heh.