#Seattle beer company defends anti-cop acronym on cans

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Mirage Beer in Seattle released an IPA in June with a stamp on the can that read “ACAB.”
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A Seattle beer company is brewing up controversy with an anti-police message on cans.

Michael Dempster — who owns Mirage Beer, which bills itself as a “farmhouse-focused” Puget Sound brewery — released a hoppy IPA in June called “Choosey Lover” that featured a stamp on the bottom of cans that read, “ACAB means all cops,” KIRO reports.

The acronym, which stands for “All cops are bastards,” is favored by some Antifa and Black Lives Matters protesters and has recently appeared at anti-police brutality demonstrations across the country — from Lower Manhattan to Portland, Oregon.

Dempster defended his anti-cop stance after getting some blowback on social media, including by some who said they’d never purchase his offerings again.

“I used the markings because I stand against institutional racism, of which modern policing is a militarized arm,” Dempster texted the station.

Anyone who disagrees with the stamped message should know that Dempster didn’t create it with those in mind, he said.

“If it means someone won’t buy my beer anymore, good,” Dempster wrote. “The beer was not created for them. I make my beer for folks who are actively anti-racist, anti-Trump, anti-fascist and pro-equality.”

The manager of Chuck’s Hop Shop in Seattle, meanwhile, acknowledged that the ACAB acronym turned some heads with beer buyers there.

“It was a thing,” Dylan Ziegler told the station. “People talked about it.”

But the anti-cop message didn’t appear to impact sales of the beer at Ziegler’s store, he said.

“I don’t think it hurt his sales at all,” Ziegler told KIRO. “I believe that his message is right, and I’m proud of him for taking a stand, honestly.”