news culture But what is this tacos story that rocked the entire internet this weekend?
The FoodChallenge is about eating an astronomical amount of food. This is a challenge that is being democratized by social networks and for which some people have become specialists in the field. But since this weekend, a drama has been shaking this small world.
A practice from South Korea
The FoodChallenge gets its western name from mukbang, a practice originating in South Korea. Specifically, it’s about filming yourself eating gigantic amounts of food, which has usually been prepared beforehand by those involved. To the point that some people get sick just by looking at these people devouring dozens of dishes of different types in a limited amount of time. This trend has become more democratic with the lockdowns that various countries have suffered during the pandemic, and some have become indispensable in this area over time. This is particularly the case at Park Seyeon, and brands have taken advantage of this phenomenon to exploit it in the form of advertising their food. Over time, the practice was also exported outside of South Korea (to measure the extent, one has to imagine that cable transmissions existed there) and became particularly popular on YouTube and Twitch. Apparently, it didn’t take long for governments to react, emphasizing the dangers of such a practice. The Korean government, for example, announced guidelines in 2018 to regulate the phenomenon.
A pinned YouTuber
Now back to our story. About a month ago, YouTuber Alan FoodChallenge — known as the “Crazy Eater” — released a video in which he devoured five gigatacos (30 pounds of meat, fries, and cheese sauce). It could have ended there, but it turns out that another YouTuber, Theo Maldini, undermined the sequence’s credibility by releasing a video of his own that castigated the Alan FoodChallenge fake page. According to Théo Maldini, the latter uses a cut (a cut) every time he puts something in his mouth. Obviously it’s just a montage and Alan FoodChallenge is fooling his community! The prospect, shaken by the accusation, then decided to answer his critic by taking on the same challenge, namely eating 5 Gigatacos live!
The problem is that he abandoned the challenge after a taco and a half, making a fool of himself in front of his fans. He then admitted that he faked the video, believing that taking five gigatacos was “impossible.” He shot the sequence in two takes, in the evening and then the next day. Unfortunately, social media can be terrifying, and this one had to cut his life short when he started receiving insults, some even going as far as calling him on his cellphone while masked. Besides the danger of this practice, this also shows that it is more than necessary to assess the consequences of plunging into the lie. One day everything will be known in the end, but when it is presented to millions of people, the impact is even stronger! Alan FoodChallenge wants to win back its audience, but the damage is probably done.
