A Singapore Karen that goes by the Twitter handle @asyqnhrn has called out a fitness enthusiast for being a racist.
The offending post? Ayam Masak Merah (literal translation: “red-cooked chicken) or Chicken in Spicy Tomato Sauce, a Malaysian dish popular in Malay cuisine.
The fitness enthusiast known as Dino Kang (@dinokang) published a post on Instagram last Monday (31 Jan) lamenting about the “ridiculously artery-clogging, heart-stopping” dishes that people are consuming everyday.
Accompanying his post is a picture of 2 sets of Ayam Masak Merah with copious amount of oil despite ordering it without gravy.
He said: “Can you imagine, putting ALL THAT OIL & SUGAR into your body day in & day out. I cannot in good conscience do that to my body.”
“…blatant racism,” says Karen
While the post did not implicitly mentioned race, one Singapore Karen felt it was “blatant racism.”
Another Karen (@heymysara) went further by accusing Dino of generalising the cuisine of the entire Malay community with his post despite the original caption not containing references to any particular race or culture.
Said Karen also pointed out that Ayam Masak Merah is food that is culturally connected to the Malays and criticising it is akin to criticising the relationship between Malays and their food.
Netizens disagree with the ‘racism’ label
Not many netizens agreed with Karen’s categorisation that Dino’s post is racist.
In fact, it is common knowledge that Ayam Masak Merah is indeed unhealthy but to go further and shut down a post written in the context of health as racism is a sign of an inferiority complex at play.
Or maybe all nutritionists are racist.
