I insulted Rick Bayless on Threads and people lost their minds over it
Social media is an odd thing.
I have never really quite figured it out and I’ve nearly tried it all. I never went viral and I never became an influencer. My “follower” numbers suck and honestly, I’ve never really tried all that hard to be good at it…whatever being good at it means. I wouldn’t know.
If you’re familiar at all with the current iterations of ‘social media’ you might say that it’s a sewer at times and yet the few times that it’s not a sewer, it’s a dirty public bathroom. Why anyone stays on it at this point is a mystery but here we all are.
I remember trying to figure out what Threads (Instagram’s answer to X), was all about back when no one one was on there and no one responded to anything.
Since X imploded, Threads has become the latest place for people to freak out on each other about random opinions and it’s every bit as toxic as X was/is. The only difference is there’s no ads…yet. I found this out the hard way recently by having an opinion of a film. Boy, was that a mistake.
No one really reads my Threads so when one of them blows up it’s always a surprise, mostly because the topics are usually nothing special.
Back in ancient times, when X was known as Twitter, and when I was regularly writing satire, I would often poke fun at Rick Bayless, the celebrity chef and brother of Skip Bayless, and it would cause people to come out of the woodwork to defend his honor.
It was always good for a laugh and it never failed - the satirical stories I wrote about him were always popular for better or for worse. If you think Beyonce’s fans are rabid, try insulting Rick Bayless some time.
This was years and years ago when social media was in its infancy. Back then I was even able to get Bayless’ own attention a few times, which was pretty funny, all things considered.
He was not amused.
He was a regular target of mine to satirize because it was like shooting fish in a barrel due to him being held in such high regard by so many people for his cooking and also his smarmy personality.
I stopped writing satire and I eventually stopped trying to intentionally provoke people for engagement on social media.
Truth be told, I had a much larger following when I did provoke people and some of my more well known spats included Jerry Springer’s producer, Luke Campbell from 2 Live Crew and of course, Rick Bayless.
Anyway, the other day I happened upon a reel of Bayless making guac and using ridiculous ingredients and I shared the video on Threads with the caption:
Campaign to keep Rick Bayless away from Mexican food.
And then I forgot about it.
When I checked back later, the post had several hundreds of replies from rabid Baylessistas telling me everything from ‘go fuck myself’ to ‘Rick could put any abuelita to shame in the kitchen’ and he’s ‘more Mexican than me’.
Several people said Rick is definitely invited to the asada. And, oh, by the way, did my culinary dumbass even know he’s a Michelin Star chef and that Mexico awarded him the coveted Aztec Eagle?!
How dare you…!
And they just kept coming. As of this post, people are still really pissed off about it and it’s comical.
This was like transporting myself back to the 2010’s in a Twitter time machine. Honestly, I didn’t know that many people still gave a shit about Rick Bayless but here we are.
According to his fans, Bayless has done more for Mexican food in the US than anyone else. Take that Glen Bell!!
The man is a bona fide saint to these people and it’s never not funny and or creepy to me.
I find all of this ridiculous and frankly, hilarious. I mean, it’s Rick Freakin’ Bayless for fuck’s sake…dopey, nerdy, pasty Rick Bayless with his white guy perfect pronunciation and polished TV Land production on everything and out of pocket recipes with weird ass ingredients.
People eat that shit up, literally.
Despite whatever accolades his fans want to bestow upon him, Bayless is still just a white dude from Oklahoma who cooks Mexican food and got famous doing it...which I’m sure had nothing at all to do with his loudmouth brother also being in the entertainment business…
And you know what? There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s a free country, or so I’m told.
Bayless has faced a shit ton of criticism over the years for being a white guy cooking Mexican food and getting rich off it it. And he’s punched back at that over the years. He definitely has a chip on his shoulder because of it. And so do his fans…
Is he deserving of all the praise his hordes of salivating kooks shower him with? Is he deserving of all the hate? That depends who you ask. And really…who cares!
Personally, he comes off as a holier-than-thou dickhead most of the time, which is not too far off from his brother, Skip, but what I find the most funny after all these years is that satire about certain things still goes way over people’s heads.
And with Bayless that’s what makes it so goddamn funny, even all these years later.
When I wrote the caption: ‘campaign to keep bayless away from Mexican food’ it was obviously tongue-in-cheek. At least it was supposed to be for all of my 80 or so followers there, 2/3 of which never interact or post.
I figured maybe a couple of people would get the joke.
I honestly did not expect so many people to take it literally and personally, as if I’d spit on their coveted Bayless autographed and framed photo over their beds.
But they did.
Truth be told, I’ve never really had anything against Bayless, personally; I don’t know the guy and have never ate his food. I do question some of his Rachel Ray-esqe cooking methods and the fact that he’s rich and the pueblas he took his recipes from remain poor.
I’m not the only person who’s ever questioned the success or the cultural appropriation because that too is also an opinion many have of him.
But honestly, it’s far too easy to poke fun at him and what he does on the surface level because it’s like hitting a bee’s nest. I’ve done it for years and it never disappoints.
Everyone’s a critic...a rabid, foaming at the mouth, unhinged critic. Stating that you enjoy his food/personality is one thing, and people are entitled to their opinion and their tastes. But trying to declare that Rick Bayless is thee be all end all, greatest creator/curator of Mexican food of all-time is not only asinine, it’s delusional and a little sick.
And that’s something even smarmy ass Bayless himself would probably agree with…after he added peeled grapes to your mom’s arroz.
S/C
F Rick Bayless!! 😂
You're such an ist...Asada-ist!