Burger King has been facing criticism today after tweeting ‘women belong in the kitchen’ on International Women’s Day.
The tweet has been criticised by followers of the famous fast food chain even though they did follow up the initial tweet with: ‘If they want to, of course. Yet only 20% of chefs are women.’
Women belong in the kitchen.
— Burger King (@BurgerKingUK) March 8, 2021
They added: ‘We’re on a mission to change the gender ratio in the restaurant industry by empowering female employees with the opportunity to pursue a culinary career.’
They followed up again with: “We are proud to be launching a new scholarship programme which will help female Burger King employees pursue their culinary dreams!”.
KFC Gaming replied to the tweet with a meme that said: “The best time to delete this post was immediately after posting it, the second best time is now”.
— KFC Gaming (@kfcgaming) March 8, 2021
Burger King replied: “Why would we delete a tweet that’s drawing attention to a huge lack of female representation in our industry, we thought you’d be on board with this as well? We’ve launched a scholarship to help give more of our female employees the chance to pursue a culinary career.”
Why would we delete a tweet that’s drawing attention to a huge lack of female representation in our industry, we thought you’d be on board with this as well? We've launched a scholarship to help give more of our female employees the chance to pursue a culinary career.
— Burger King (@BurgerKingUK) March 8, 2021
KFC gaming were not the only people criticising Burger King for the tweet, one person said: “Surely it’s not the day for this? Any day tbh. Grabbing media attention by being deliberately obtuse? By reinforcing stereotypes (even in apparently good humour?) Not good marketing or behaviour.”
Another person replied to the tweet saying: “You’re supposed to be a professional social media team, but this was executed very poorly. Leading with ironic sexism in a tweet that can be (and has been) retweeted out of context is totally amateurish. Whatever the admirable sentiment of the thread may be, it’s lost now.”
Another person said: “The absolute wrong way… Women have fought AGES to break these stereotypes. Maybe there’s less women in cooking because we realized were able to accomplish more so we fill other jobs. When me FINALLY realized their potential in the kitchen”
What belongs in the trash is lack of female representation in our industry, that's why we've created a scholarship to do something about it.
— Burger King (@BurgerKingUK) March 8, 2021
At the time of writing, the tweet had been re-tweeted over 100,000 times. It is trending on International Women’s Day.
