As you’ve no doubt heard by now, the craft brewing industry is currently amidst a reckoning over an outpouring of stories detailing sexism, discrimination, and sexual harassment and abuse women have experienced in the craft beer business. The stories are horrifying and traumatic, and together they reveal (yet again) that the craft beer business was never “99 percent asshole-free.” Thanks to the many women coming forward, and the brave efforts of Brienne Allan, the production manager at Massachusetts’ Notch Brewing who has surfaced these thousand-plus accounts via her Instagram account (@ratmagnet), more people are waking up to that.
The sheer volume of the allegations, and the outrage they’ve inspired, makes progress seem inevitable right now. But as any seasoned activist can tell you, turning online anger into consistent, ongoing offline action is akin to alchemy. As Advanced Cicerone Em Sauter told my colleague Beth Demmon, who reported VinePair’s initial story on this grim situation: “This is one of those things where I’m worried we’ll all talk about it, and then we don’t talk about it anymore.”