When Naming Goes Awry

An interesting email in the inbox this morning.

I was at Beermongers about a month ago and saw that Hop Valley had a beer on tap called "Mouth Raper IPA."  I had always known that beer as "MR IPA" or "Mr. IPA," but apparently the real name is--according to the bartenders there at Beermongers--Mouth Raper.  That's what it says on the keg and that's what it says on the bill of lading (according to said bartenders).  

I sent Hop Valley a tweet asking them to verify the name, but received no response.  In hindsight, I think my tweet was more accusatory instead of inquisitive, but the fact is they never responded.  

@HopValley seriously?  Mouth Raper IPA?  Inappropriate, insensitive, stupid.  I expect better from local breweries.  Don't be douche-bros.
— oregone (@oregone) December 21, 2013

So my question is as follows:  Am I right in thinking this is totally inappropriate and insensitive?  Are Oregon craft brewers past the point the where they have to be crass or tasteless when naming their beers?  

Taking a quick cruise around the internet, I found enough evidence to confirm that this is the real name of  the beer.  I think it's pretty clear that the brewery gets how controversial it is, which is why it was so hard to track down in the first place.  To answer Oregone's question--yes, it is totally inappropriate and insensitive.  Undeniably.*  Given that this is a brewery with a beer called Double D Blonde, they probably need to pay special attention to the way they think about and depict women.  (And here's a handy rule of thumb: if you would be uncomfortable explaining the name of a beer to your seven-year-old daughter, maybe it's not a good name.)

On the other hand, I think it's worth acknowledging that we don't want to got too far down Outrage road.  Although Mouth Raper is an incredibly boneheaded name, you can see how they got there.  Trying to communicate the sense of hop intensity, they used a term without thinkinh about how wildly offensive it would be to many people.  In some cases, breweries use provocative names to drum up press, and sometimes they use them because they don't realize how provocative they'll be.  Back-of-the-envelope math puts the number of US beers somewhere in the 30,000 to 50,000 range.  Some of those are going to have ill-conceived names.

What should you do when you inadvertently learn you've used a racist, sexist, or religiously offensive name for your beer?  Dump the name and apologize.  What should we as beer drinkers do when a brewery dumps an offensive name and apologizes?  Accept it and move on.

As to Mouth Raper: the ball's in your court, Hop Valley.

__________________
*I could devote an entire blog to the hermeneutics of offensive speech.  Indeed, I suspect there are hundreds already in existence.  Discussions about offensive speech generally lead to bad place and hurt feelings, so you'll pardon me while I skip the "why" part of the rape-is-offensive post.  Think of your mothers, sisters, and daughters when you consider the term.  If you want to think very deeply about offensive speech, start reading Ta Nahisi Coates.  This article isn't a terrible place to start.



 Update: No, not about Hop Valley.  I finally got around to reading this post and realized (again!) that it needed a light edit.  I promise to learn.  But of course, I've been promising that for years.

Puns are the Lowest Form of Beer Names

pun (n): the usually humorous use of a word in such a way as to suggest two or more of its meanings or the meaning of another word similar in sound.   

I used to calculate that there were about 20,000 beers produced in the United States each year--figuring about ten beers a brewery.   Oh, those gentle old times!  I was recently looking at the beer lists of the largest three breweries (Boston Beer, Sierra Nevada, and New Belgium), and they will produce a combined eighty-three beers this year--28 each.  So probably, given the spurt of new brewery openings and the inexorable logic of the novelty curve, there are something like double that number.  That means two things: 1) more beer than any human can even comprehend, much less drink, and 2) lots and lots of bad beer names.

The worst are puns.

I was reminded of this when I got an email that Ninkasi (maker of Helles Belles and Maiden the Shade) was releasing their tasty winter sticke, Sleigh'r.  It seems no one can make a rye ale without succumbing to pun--usually with increasingly abstruse meaning.  When I was drinking Smooth Ryed with some friends, not a single one got the joke--they all just thought it was a strange and inexplicable name.  A contender for most blighted by puns are fresh hop beers, where at least half have punny names.  

I get it.  My father was late in his family's birth order, and by the time my grandparents got to him they said (paraphrasing), "screw it--no middle name for you."  Brewers have to come up with dozens of names, one every other week or so, and they get a little overwhelmed.  A pun pops into the noggin, and it both amuses and gives some insight into the type of beer: seems like a good idea.  I chose to call out Ninkasi because I am amused by those names.  All three of the ones I mentioned are triple-meaning puns, referencing not just the style/season in the name, but a favorite heavy metal band.  Matt Van Wyk once named a beer Willamette Dammit and I swooned.  So they're not all terrible.

But I would like to put in a request on behalf of beer drinkers everywhere.  Mind the puns.  Like crystal malt, they are best when used sparingly.  What they offer in amusement they many times lack in memorability.  Sometimes they don't make sense because the reference is too obscure.  Often they require spellings that make rational people blanch.  Sometimes they're just bad.  Name beers after your family, your pets, your favorite salmon species, but beware the seductive allure of the pun.  There's a reason everyone groans when you make a pun in mixed company, and the same is true for beer names.