Please Don't Gender My Dinner (the whole "girl dinner" trend)
(WTAF??????? I just ran across this, and, apparently, there is a whole subgenre on social media about this. Apart from all the other issues, the fact that it is called "GIRL dinner" when we are talking adult women, drives me nuts on so many levels. )
Please Don't Gender My Dinner (the whole "girl dinner" trend)
"Girl dinner" is all over TikTok and Instagram, but as a social media editor, I'm finding the trend a little hard to swallow.
By Merlyn Miller
Published on July 28, 2023
https://www.foodandwine.com/thmb/DoUMsHihncTxQtngwmYtg8AQpgg=/750x0/filters:no_upscale():max_bytes(150000):strip_icc():format(webp)/Please-Dont-Gender-My-Dinner-FT-BLOG0723-3f85829902a04e66a16156bc95903947.jpg
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I won’t pretend that I’m the first person to have a take on “girl dinner.” This video meme that's taken over TikTok and Instagram usually features clips of charcuterie board-ish snack dinners, although some more tongue-in-cheek spins might spotlight a lone rotisserie chicken in a car or plate of tortilla chips that have been microwaved with shredded cheddar cheese on top. The overarching theme is the same: "girl dinner" is an assemblage of ingredients so low effort, it might not be considered a proper or well-rounded meal. And with the glut of girl dinner content comes just as many critiques, including its possible romanticization of disordered eating by suggesting that it’s cool or normal to eat a few tiny bites for dinner, pointing out that having a snack plate for dinner is not a new concept, or that the trend appropriates a style of eating that’s been present in some cultures for centuries.
While I might generally be inclined to let sleeping dogs lie and refrain from throwing another opinion into the void of the internet, I can’t stop thinking about the implications that the gendered language brings with it — especially since as a social media editor at a food publication, it's my job to observe how these things intersect. If we home in on the “girl” part of girl dinner, what does the phenomenon reveal about the unrealistic expectations that social media can create for how and what women should be eating?
The more people save, share, and swipe, the more the audience for girl dinner grows, and the more accepted the concept becomes.
— Merlyn Miller
By not-so-subtly hinting that young women default to eating dainty, snacky meals, girl dinner is just the most recent reflection of gender stereotypes that have existed for centuries. You might think that as a culture, we’re past the days of assuming that women should be cooking for their husbands (and that it always is a husband they’re cooking for), but this fad is really just another way of reinforcing the trope that when a woman is cooking for a man, she makes a robust meal, but when she’s alone, she has a plate of cheese and crackers. The assumption of this trope is that women only cook for others out of a sense of duty, because they themselves don’t eat much. And although plenty of stories about girl dinner have done an excellent job at pointing this out, what I find concerning is that in spite of this rather obvious criticism, young people on social media continue to buy into the trend, as evidenced by the hundreds of millions of views that #girldinner has on multiple social media platforms.
If you follow food content creators or frequently watch cooking videos on social media, this is everywhere. When you engage with girl dinner content, the algorithm becomes more likely to show you similar videos, and it’s more likely to show that content to someone else. The more people save, share, and swipe, the more the audience for girl dinner grows, and the more accepted the concept becomes.
Especially in my profession, I am well aware that social media harbors people with deeply harmful, oppressive views, but luckily those views don’t often become a mimicable viral trend that affects what people are putting on their plates and in their mouths in real life. Girl dinner is not on par with the mass embrace of something intentionally problematic, but I worry that it signals a lack of critical thinking. A single person participating in this silly meme is such a small blip on the landscape of social media, but when it reaches the scale of 470 million views on TikTok, it becomes a little less clear if girl dinner is something that’s funny and cute, or if we really are buying into the idea that a woman would eat 12 raisins and a piece of salami for dinner.
Want to Know What the Server Really Thinks of You? They're Talking About It on TikTok
Like many other social media trends, girl dinner creates a spectacle out of women eating. People love to watch women consume food, as evidenced by the clear skew towards one gender amongst mukbang creators who record videos of themselves eating, typically with magnified audio, as well as a popular theme of women devouring takeout in their cars. Perhaps this is because seeing women eat so publicly contrasts with the expectation that they perform “femininity” and maintain a specific — namely smaller — body type by eating less than men. (I’m thinking of the age-old trope that a woman will order a salad when out on a dinner date with a man, because how dare I tackle something so masculine as a hamburger.)
. . . . .
https://www.foodandwine.com/the-girl-dinner-trend-is-taking-over-tiktok-and-instagram-7567202
How Problematic Is Girl Dinner, Really?
The TikTok trend has gone from cute meme to subject of think pieces condemning it as dangerous. We asked a dietitian to weigh in.
By Stephanie McNeal
July 22, 2023
https://media.glamour.com/photos/64bbbce90c9cae60a865e054/master/w_1280,c_limit/girldinner2.png
You know those nights when your significant other is working late, so, instead of cooking a meal, you just kind of graze? Now it has a name: “girl dinner.” And it seems everyone has an opinion on it. The phrase was coined on TikTok by a woman named Olivia Maher, who posted a video in May discussing how much she enjoys the simple pleasure of a meal of just light snacks. “This is my dinner,” she said, showing off her slice of bread, butter, a few grapes, cheese, and wine. “I call it girl dinner, or medieval peasant.”
The beauty of the trend, like many things that go mega-viral online, is that Maher gave a cute and catchy name to something that is relatable to so many. Cooking sucks sometimes, and it can feel like a real treat just to indulge in whatever you can find in your house that you feel like eating, no pots or pans or thoughts or worries required. The fun is in the lack of effort, the deliciousness of indulging in your laziest instincts. In a world of meal prep and overnight oats, the freedom of taking the dregs of your cupboards and turning it into something delicious can’t be understated. “The girl dinner is a giddy experience,” Maher told The New York Times (because yes, girl dinner made the Times). “You could be having the slice of frozen pizza, but you’ve also got maybe a glass of wine and some grapes to go with it. And you’re just so pleased with yourself. You’re like, ‘I barely worked for this and it feels like an indulgence.’ That’s what makes it girl dinner.”
. . . .
We asked Vanessa Rissetto, a registered dietitian and CEO of Culina Health, to weigh in, and she tells Glamour that it’s not so black-and-white. “It's totally fine once in a while to add a bunch of cheese, meat, fruit, and veggies to a plate and call it ‘dinner,’” she says. “It's summer and currently 95 degrees in NYC—and in many cities—each and every day. The last thing any of us want to do is turn on the stove…. That being said, be sure the plate includes protein, vegetables, and carbohydrates.” Rissetto agrees, though, that if you are doing girl dinner every night, or using it as an excuse to undereat, it can be a slippery slope. “Eating only pickles for dinner, drinking Coke Zero as your meal—this trend can fall into the disordered eating territory, especially when it comes to people promoting and applauding it,” Rissetto says. “Remember, it's all about the messaging and who's delivering it.”
. . . .
But does that mean girl dinners on their own are promoting disordered eating? I don’t think so, personally. When I watch the videos of girl dinners, what I’m noticing isn’t actually the meals themselves (which, in truth, are sometimes disgusting) but the delight the women are taking in the beauty of not caring. In a world where it sometimes feels like women need to optimize every second of their existences, where we are told to count calories and macros and double-wash our vegetables and make gluten-free substitutes and avoid dairy, sometimes it can be delicious to just pile up a big mound of hummus and crackers and call it a day. It’s not about restriction; it’s about indulging in the freedom of not giving a F. Of eating what you want, even if it is just soda and a pickle.
At least, that was the creator’s original intention. In an interview with the Today show, Maher emphasized that girl dinner isn’t about the ingredients at all. Anything can be a girl dinner, if it makes you happy.
https://www.glamour.com/story/girl-dinner