The Dangerous Spiral of the “Girl Dinner” Trend
design: Katie Huang
No girl, frozen strawberries and a Diet Dr. Pepper isn’t a real meal.
by OLIVIA RODRIGUEZ ★ SEPTEMBER 24, 2023
Like any average college-aged girl today, I am not immune to the powers of the TikTok algorithm. Even when I don’t mean to, I find myself scrolling for hours and hours at a time. On one of my more recent trips down the TikTok rabbit hole, I found myself face-to-face with a new trend: Girl Dinner. If you’re unfamiliar, “girl dinner” is essentially a joke about the commonality of girls making meals out of a smorgasbord of snacks, fruits, side dishes, and leftovers. Or, as the New York Times liked to describe it, “Akin to an aesthetically pleasing Lunchable.”
The trend, started by Olivia Maher, started off as really fun and relatable—a way for women to share the universal experience of eating chicken nuggets, Ritz crackers, and berries for dinner. The simple joys of creating a meal void of cooking and dirty dishes. However, like most things on TikTok, the trend spiraled into something worse. Slowly, the videos under the Girl Dinner trend transformed from side dishes that would never normally go together, into something that barely qualifies as a snack. The trend has been polluted by videos of women posting a single Dr.Pepper or a handful of Goldfish as their “meal.” TikTok user @violetstanza commented, “...but the fact that this is called ‘girl dinner’ makes it seem like young women are supposed to be able to get by only eating morsels of food at a time instead of actual meals.”
The trend not only glamorizes disordered eating by making a few crumbs of food seem like a cute little trend, it also specifically targets vulnerable women and young girls. The “girl” in girl dinner asserts that only women should be counting their calorie intake. TikTok is an app that is targeted towards adolescents. If a young girl sees the kind of popular “meals” under this trend, she could grow up to believe that this is normal and healthy eating behavior. It implements a dangerous narrative to girls at such a young age that can spawn bad eating habits at best and, at worst, disordered eating behaviors.
Unfortunately, the trend doesn’t stop there. Girl Dinner has snowballed into other corners of the internet, creating new and equally dangerous trends. One such trend is dubbed “Girl Math,” This trend refers to users, specifically women, justifying outrageous spending through convoluted explanations, loopholes, and “savings.” Tiktoker @mckennaelianna says, “Anything under $5 is free, anything I buy with a gift card is free, if I buy something and then I return it, I’ve made money….”
While, again, the trend seems fun and harmless on the surface, there is a darker underbelly to girl math. Just like girl dinner, the specific addition of the word “girl” before the name of the trend attaches femininity to it. It reinforces negative stereotypes about women and our ability to handle finances. The trend assumes that women are nothing more than frivolous and irresponsible spenders who need “girl math” to justify their actions. Again, this can be dangerous to young girls exposed to the trend. It may give them the idea that women are ditzy, incapable, and unfit to pursue areas of finance or STEM.
I can appreciate a silly little TikTok trend as much as the next girl. However, to turn a blind eye to the dangers of trends like “Girl Dinner” and “Girl Math” would be a disservice to the girls and women of all ages who may be harmed by them. To combat trends that can glamorize disordered eating practices or perpetuate harmful stereotypes about women, it is important to uplift one another. Fostering an online community of acceptance and holding one another accountable is essential to putting an end to sexist trends. Girl Dinner and Girl Math were able to spin out of control because of the pre-existing obstacles that women face every single day. The best way to grow is to learn from our mistakes and promote a society where all women can be healthy, capable, and happy.
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