I think this is the last time I’ll post an essay to Facebook. During a period of my life where I was convinced I wasn’t writing, it turned out I’d poured hundreds of thousands of words here and on reddit. All of it practice, all of it scales, all of it worth it. Getting feedback and doing all of that while I’m learning improv. It’s comfortable, and productive for these apps but not for me, which is a reason I need to stop.
I wrote this today, a first draft of an ekphrasis on these random mukbang videos I kept getting on instagram. I avoided them, but then today I watched them. All of them in a narrow subgenre, a niche within a niche within a niche. And I feel like good or bad, it’s me. This is my voice. I’m proud to be here.
—
DEATH ROW MUKBANG
Men coded white in the U.S. are obsessed with making lists, and ranking the lists, about their preferences and how those preferences matter. They assert that their opinion matters, on any subject, and are gonna tell you something.
For example, the multiple social media videos made by multiple creators where they describe crimes of people on death row, make their last meal, eat it, then rank the last meal of the murderers. It’s not even that there’s one of these, it’s that multiple men are making the same videos, with the main difference being the rating system they use. And facial hair. There are alternate offshoots, where a creator will make a representative meal from a country’s prison system. But it’s the death row cooking mukbangs which struck me.
The creators making death row cooking mukbang videos all largely share the same opinions, editing style and even cadence. Their shared ideology says boldly, “Yes, but you must hear MY take on why pedophilic serial murderer John Wayne Gacy’s last meal of 12 fried shrimp, a bucket of original recipe KFC, french fries, and a pound of strawberries is mid.” Most of the meals are mid. If the murderer ordered a lot of different things, like they were at a Sizzler’s salad bar or all you can mangia buffet, those tend to rank higher. Pizza almost always does well.
All of them unknowingly starting from a photo series made by Henry Hargaves in 2015, and then wondering not what the meals say about culture, their crimes, or their reaction to the crimes and the mundanity. They just ask, “how good was the judgement of these psychopaths when it comes to ordering a decent dinner?” As if the subject was whose Mom makes the best Friday sleepover feast.
I’m not here to condemn these ceasars and their salads, but truly to praise them. Because they’re reminders about the criticality of voice, and of having enough confidence to say, “my voice matters.” Whoever told you the first time to fake it till you make it was wrong. There’s nothing fake about a death row cooking mukbang video. Be bold. Eat. Rank. Like. Subscribe.
I don’t have anything to say about John Wayne Gacy’s dining choices. But it’s not lost on me that had he been born thirty years later, he would’ve made TikTok videos dressed as a clown, and probably would’ve made sure to let everyone know why he’s rated the last meal of Ted Bundy, (an uneaten steak, eggs, toast with butter and jam, hash browns, coffee and juice) “4 out of 10, mid at best, making it C-tier.”