Social Media Focus: The Rise of Mukbangs
Have you ever seen videos of people eating abnormal amounts of food and thinking about how they can eat that? Videos like this are called mukbangs. Mukbangs are normally live-streamed videos that feature a person eating a large quantity of food and addressing the audience. The origin of Mukbangs dates back to 2009 in South Korea and became extensive in Western countries by 2014. Some famous content creators such as Nikocado Avocado, Ninja Frog, and Zach Choi ASMR regularly post mukbang videos on YouTube. There are numerous smaller creators on other platforms such as TikTok that post mukbangs consisting of food compilations of eating Wingstop, Chick-fil-A, Crumbl Cookies, and more. Recently, Crumbl Cookie reviews have become very popular on TikTok. Crumbl Cookie is a company that sells its own unique cookie lineup and has a new one every Monday. The weekly cookie lineups have inspired creators to post new mukbang videos every week while taking bites or consuming all the cookies. Each Crumbl Cookie has an average of 720 calories. Many of these creators consume large amounts of food and calories, not to mention the consequences of creating mukbang content which could lead to lifelong eating disorders.
For example, Nicholas Perry, also known as Nikocado Avocado, started YouTube in 2014 which consisted of vegan and lifestyle vlogs and musical performances. On September 1, 2016, Perry shifted from his vegan content to new and exciting mukbangs. Perry consumed shocking amounts of food in his videos while consistently posting on his YouTube channel, which led to his rapid weight gain. Perry weighed 411 pounds at his peak and many people were concerned about his well-being.
There are many side effects to mukbangs, not only to those who produce the content but to the viewers as well. Watching someone binge eat can encourage eating disorders or lead some viewers to develop one. In these cases, young people might attempt to imitate the influencer, consuming large amounts of food. This could put them at risk of weight gain, obesity, several health problems, or even death. Several studies have concluded that mukbang watching might have negative consequences for the viewers including increased consumption of food because of social comparison or mimicry; as well as body dysmorphia. Over time, mukbangs and consuming large amounts of food have become normalized. Other companies such as Starbucks and Dunkin Donuts create new drinks and menus such as their holiday menus which tempt consumers to try these new drinks and end up overconsuming as they want to try the whole menu.
Watching mukbangs can even become an addiction for some. The stages of addiction begin with preoccupation. When people are not watching mukbangs, they begin to spend time thinking about previous mukbangs they have watched and wonder what the content of the next video will be. Next is withdrawal, which is when the person begins to feel anger or frustration, even stress or become sad when they are not able to watch mukbangs. Stage three is tolerance. People start spending more of their time watching mukbangs in order to feel satisfied and happy. Furthermore, there is the inability to stop. The contributor cannot fully stop watching mukbangs even when they try to quit or reduce their consumption on watching mukbangs. They next begin to lose interest in other hobbies including work life or social life because of their desire to watch mukbangs. Next is when contributors resume watching mukbangs even though they experience work/education/relationship/sleep problems because of excessive mukbang watching. The contributor begins lying to friends or family and hiding their mukbang-watching behavior and how much time they have spent on mukbangs. Stage eight is resorting to mukbangs to relieve your negative mood and transform those feelings into positive ones. Lastly is stage nine which leads to risking relationships after jeopardizing and neglecting relationships with family and friends due to their engagement in excessive mukbang watching.
In 2021, China passed an anti-food waste law, which among other things, bans the streaming filming, or sharing of mukbang videos. The Chinese leader Xi Jinping mentioned that these mukbangs are acts of food waste and are a βdistressingβ issue that threatens Chinaβs food security. Having these videos promotes excessive consumption of food and has multiple negative effects that have been discussed through social media and many other platforms.