Cave men

Super Bowl LIX failed to deliver a historic three-peat for the Chiefs, but it did give us a cultural moment worth dissecting. While Kansas City uses the offseason to pursue a football dynasty, another brand dynasty is attempting a comeback of its own: Bud Light.

Its Super Bowl ad was a bid to regain customers alienated by the 2023 campaign featuring transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney. The tone was different—back to humor and over-the-top ’Muricana—but the real problem remained: one that was less about botched marketing and more about anxious leadership putting cultural approval ahead of mission.

In his new book Last Call for Bud Light, former Anheuser-Busch InBev executive Anson Frericks argued that the Mulvaney campaign marked the culmination of a period when the company—“having failed to deliver new products, catchy campaigns, or fresh ideas”—shifted its focus to corporate progressivism. In doing so, it prioritized trendy ESG (environmental, social, and governance) policies above all.

Bud Light’s implosion is a warning: Any organization—business, church, or family—becomes vulnerable when leaders merely react to pressure. Joe Rigney, a pastor and scholar, examined this dynamic in two short but potent books, Leadership and Emotional Sabotage and The Sin of Empathy. He argues that empathy detached from truth becomes an instrument of manipulation. “Empathy,” Rigney told me, “is one of the primary ways leaders are sabotaged. In reactive communities, empathy becomes a power tool in the hands of the sensitive.” These communities adapt to their most immature and reactive members, sabotaging leaders who try to stand firm.

He contrasts Biblical compassion—tethered to truth—with cultural empathy, which demands validating any feeling. “Biblical compassion is like standing on the riverbank and offering a hand to someone drowning. Untethered empathy jumps in—and gets swept away.” This, he argues, is why so many leaders flinch when outrage flares—whether it’s a college giving in to social-media mobs, a church backing off Biblical teaching, or a corporation surrendering to activists.

For example, Saddleback Church Pastor Andy Wood found himself apologizing for an Instagram post offering a prayer for President Trump on Inauguration Day. Likewise, Wheaton College deleted a post congratulating alumnus Russ Vought on his confirmation as Trump’s budget director after receiving, within hours, “more than 1,000 hostile comments, primarily incendiary [and] unchristian.” College spokesman Joseph Moore said in an emailed statement that the deletion “was in no way an apology” but an attempt to forestall an online distraction. He had “no further information” on whether Wheaton has a policy for acknowledging alumni achievements or how the school determines how much online criticism justifies removing a post.

These aren’t just isolated missteps. They reveal a broader leadership crisis—a fear of standing firm in the face of cultural hostility, Rigney says. His work builds on the late Edwin Friedman’s Failure of Nerve—a landmark book on non-anxious leadership. Rigney’s prescription for leaders is simple but tough medicine:

1) Cultivate self-awareness. Leaders must recognize when they are tempted to flinch—to avoid hard truths out of fear of backlash.

2) Fear God, not man. Only a deep-rooted confidence in God’s approval can stabilize a leader in the face of cultural anxiety storms.

3) Maintain mission clarity. Leaders must refuse to be derailed by emotional manipulation or social pressure, resisting the false promise of appeasement.

Leaders who refuse to cave to social outrage often outlast those who appease it. That’s what leaders at AB InBev missed. I asked Rigney if Bud Light’s downfall was an example of leadership sabotage on a global scale. “Absolutely,” he said. “The problem was mission drift. The goal shifted from making quality beer for core customers to impressing progressive institutional investors.”

A Super Bowl pivot won’t solve a fundamental leadership failure. Frericks argues that companies will have to choose between activist agendas and the market. Rigney believes the lesson applies everywhere: “Resisting cultural insanity comes at a cost. If you refuse to affirm falsehoods, you’ll be called cruel, unloving, maybe worse. But if leaders cave, they won’t gain peace—they’ll just invite more demands.”

That’s the test before CEOs, pastors, and parents alike. Bud Light learned the hard way that you can’t appease your way to success. More leaders, inside and outside the church, would do well to take note.