Once again the stench of heresy assaults my nostrils. Our Mother Church has voted at its recent AGM in favour of this motion:
"This Conference agrees that UK beer lovers have been badly let down by the lack of leadership and imagination shown by the multinational brewers and large property firms that, between them, control the UK beer trade. Conference therefore instructs the National Executive to ensure that all relevant CAMRA publications and communications pledge preferential support to beer producers and suppliers that are independent of the influence of the multinational brewers, and to make the case persistently for this stance."
That CAMRA is favouring smaller brewers over large is nothing new, I can remember the wailing and gnashing of teeth when Allied Breweries (one of the "Big Six") won the Champion Beer of Britain in 1990. I can't help but think though that the formal adoption of this motion is making the error of modernism, denying objective truth.
I am a man of simple faith, not a CAMRA theologian, but beer that is pleasing to god is defined by being matured by secondary fermentation in the container from which it is dispensed. Such fripperies as as the share ownership of the company producing it are irrelevant. And have not heathens complaining about listings in the Good Book regularly been told the correct orthodox position that inclusions are based beer quality not other minor matters?
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| Beer that is pleasing to god. And I didn't need to visit Companies House to determine that. |
Over in barbarian lands the Brewers Association regularly changed their definition of "craft brewery" and now the beer produced doesn't get a look in at all. Just about all that's left is that share ownership is mostly independent. Producing as much beer as the country of Denmark produces annually is fine and I have no idea what benefit being independent brings us. I wouldn't not like to see this road to hell being followed over here.
I've drunk good and bad cask beer from both independent and multinational breweries. I've also worked at small and large breweries. The multinationals are undoubtedly evil but then again some of the biggest cunts most awful people I've ever met have been running small breweries. Let us remain true to the core beliefs of our faith and venerate all beer that is pleasing to god.
" Such fripperies as as the share ownership of the company producing it are irrelevant. And have not heathens complaining about listings in the Good Book regularly been told the correct orthodox position that inclusions are based beer quality not other minor matters?"
ReplyDeleteAbsolutely spot on, and this is one reason I still drink the beer of AB-InBev owned Devils Backbone Brewing pretty often. It is beer quality that counts and the head brewer at DB is the same guy that won all those precious awards at GABF.
More challenging is the gnostic mindset that some sections of the beer drinking world insist on having that they, and seemingly they alone, can tell the difference in the flavour of the beer from one day to the next based on the identity of shareholders.
Cheers! And excellent work bringing the Gnostics in. Which lead me to this biblical quote: "...keep safe what has been entrusted to your care. Avoid the profane talk and foolish arguments of what some people wrongly call “Knowledge.” For some have claimed to possess it, and as a result they have lost the way of faith."
ReplyDeleteThe fact that a brewery is "independent" is useful to know, and may inform your beer choice, but it really shouldn't be used as a proxy for a mark of quality, as SIBA have done.
ReplyDeleteThere's no bright line between industrial and indie, and scale is always relative. (Railway arch is truly authentic? I say my garage is more so. And someone can trump me by invoking his bathtub).
ReplyDeletePeople who plump for indie at all costs are often trying to speak as much for their politics, generally leftish, as anything else. Which is their right, but it has nothing really to do with, as you say, the share register, and certainly the production line.
And if it matters, I was there at the dawn of indie, and more or less CAMRA too, and independent was not prized then as an absolute value. It was prized because, and to the extent, it offered additional choice of value.
Yes, I think it's mixing up two things.
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