4 ms·

It smacks of entitlement when dining at a restaurant is considered basic necessity and preparing your own meals is considered a luxury. Think about history. Thi

by bregma 5y ago

It smacks of entitlement when dining at a restaurant is considered basic necessity and preparing your own meals is considered a luxury. Think about history. Think about the vast, vast majority of people on earth. Consider just how entitled one must be to have the help prepare your basic necessities of life.

dagw 5y ago
By that argument, indoor plumbing and safe running water can also be considered luxuries. Which, while true, is rather reductivist. And if we want to talk history, having food made for you by other rather than making it yourself is not a new thing. Having a servant or a wife/mother/grandmother making you dinner was far more common in the past than it is now. I'd probably guess that more people know how to cook and cook their own food today, than at just about any other time in history
- atatatat 5y ago
  Stirring Mac and cheese or warming a Hot Pocket is not on the same level as roasting a pig and such, but I agree with the local point you're making.
  - Werewolf255 5y ago
    These are all just spinning food products around or on a heat source, sounds like we could just abstract and reuse that module without coding up a behavior for each 'new' cooking technique.
- mkr-hn 5y ago
  It's remarkable how much those restaurants they uncovered in Pompeii resemble modern versions. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermopolium https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermopolium
Broken_Hippo 5y ago
Fast food has been a staple of life since antiquity: For centuries, folks went to the baker to get bread, since home kitchen facilities were very limited. Women have been stuck in home kitchens for eons, with male family members not learning even basic skills unless they were employed as cooks or bakers. I think we've been depending on others for food prep for a very, very long time.
- jbluepolarbear 5y ago
  That’s extremely sexist. I for one am an excellent cook, I’m not a women, and I haven’t been employed for my cooking abilities. I learned to cook because I wasn’t able to experience restaurants. I was tired of the bland boring food my parents made. I started cooking our meals and I would copy from tv shows, magazines. I wanted better food, but couldn’t afford to have it prepared for me so I learned a skill. Any restaurant food is considered a luxury to me. I aggressively budgeted so that I could start going to restaurants as an adult. My cooking abilities only got better when I was able to taste the food that I’d been mimicking for so long. For me a normal family meal cost $20, a single value meal at McDonald’s is $10. So for my family a meal at McDonald’s would be $40 minimum. That increases as the greatly as you transition into sit down meals; where a meal is $15 per person and that’s before tip so $80. How are these not luxury expenses? 1 meal at a restaurant cost as much as 4 at home and those home meals will also produce leftovers for lunches. Before COVID I would eat out 1 times a week with my family and 1-2 times a week for lunch. At that frequency it’s still a lot of money and I have always treated it as a luxury expense that is part food and part entertainment.
  - prewett 5y ago
    Recounting historical realities is sexist? How does one talk about history then, since history is chock-full of inequalities? And might there be some decent, non-sexist reasons why women cooked and men didn't, consistently, over large periods of time and many different cultures?
  - imwillofficial 5y ago
    “That’s extremely sexist.” No it isn’t, GP was recounting historical norms. Get off your high horse.
chalst 5y ago
In developing countries, the urban poor frequently don't live in places with cooking facilities and have to eat prepared food.

by bregma 5y ago

dagw 5y ago

By that argument, indoor plumbing and safe running water can also be considered luxuries. Which, while true, is rather reductivist. And if we want to talk history, having food made for you by other rather than making it yourself is not a new thing. Having a servant or a wife/mother/grandmother making you dinner was far more common in the past than it is now. I'd probably guess that more people know how to cook and cook their own food today, than at just about any other time in history

atatatat 5y ago
Stirring Mac and cheese or warming a Hot Pocket is not on the same level as roasting a pig and such, but I agree with the local point you're making.
- Werewolf255 5y ago
  These are all just spinning food products around or on a heat source, sounds like we could just abstract and reuse that module without coding up a behavior for each 'new' cooking technique.
mkr-hn 5y ago
It's remarkable how much those restaurants they uncovered in Pompeii resemble modern versions. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermopolium https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermopolium

Broken_Hippo 5y ago

Fast food has been a staple of life since antiquity: For centuries, folks went to the baker to get bread, since home kitchen facilities were very limited. Women have been stuck in home kitchens for eons, with male family members not learning even basic skills unless they were employed as cooks or bakers. I think we've been depending on others for food prep for a very, very long time.

jbluepolarbear 5y ago
That’s extremely sexist. I for one am an excellent cook, I’m not a women, and I haven’t been employed for my cooking abilities. I learned to cook because I wasn’t able to experience restaurants. I was tired of the bland boring food my parents made. I started cooking our meals and I would copy from tv shows, magazines. I wanted better food, but couldn’t afford to have it prepared for me so I learned a skill. Any restaurant food is considered a luxury to me. I aggressively budgeted so that I could start going to restaurants as an adult. My cooking abilities only got better when I was able to taste the food that I’d been mimicking for so long. For me a normal family meal cost $20, a single value meal at McDonald’s is $10. So for my family a meal at McDonald’s would be $40 minimum. That increases as the greatly as you transition into sit down meals; where a meal is $15 per person and that’s before tip so $80. How are these not luxury expenses? 1 meal at a restaurant cost as much as 4 at home and those home meals will also produce leftovers for lunches. Before COVID I would eat out 1 times a week with my family and 1-2 times a week for lunch. At that frequency it’s still a lot of money and I have always treated it as a luxury expense that is part food and part entertainment.
- prewett 5y ago
  Recounting historical realities is sexist? How does one talk about history then, since history is chock-full of inequalities? And might there be some decent, non-sexist reasons why women cooked and men didn't, consistently, over large periods of time and many different cultures?
- imwillofficial 5y ago
  “That’s extremely sexist.” No it isn’t, GP was recounting historical norms. Get off your high horse.

chalst 5y ago

In developing countries, the urban poor frequently don't live in places with cooking facilities and have to eat prepared food.