Proliferation of the Mighty Cupcake

I declare "cupcabobs" the next food trend.

Somehow cupcakes started popping up everywhere. One might say they have risen (eh, eh) to fame through some strange, cult-like celebrity obsession. One minute the Sex and the City girls are eating cupcakes on a bench on Bleecker Street, and suddenly these creamy little morsels have do-or-die television competitions dedicated to their extravagance. Cake Wrecks will even provide adequate coverage of the ugliest cupcake cakes, dubbed “CCCs” by the writers, Jen and John, propelling even gelatinous blob cakes into popularity.

The Inquisitive Epicure: Looking at Food Media

A CakeWrecks inspired baby-carrot-cake reminds us that we are what we eat.

There has always been a lot of talk surrounding the rhetoric of food. From advertising fatty and sugary foods to kids, to showcasing skinny, indulgent Food Network chefs and models who eat nothing, the epicurean world has its own culture of communications.

Just the other day I stumbled across three real, ironic Po-Mo carrot advertisements featured in the New York Times that mock the stereotypical ways junk food is sold. These ads made me realize it would be interesting to decipher how food is commoditized (or why it’s not, in some cases), why realism is often manipulated in food representation, and how food can become a medium itself. After all, we are what we eat, and the way we consume comes with big messages that we cannot ignore.

So what are the gender stereotypes behind food? How are we empowered and disempowered by food and food media? How do others convince us to consume? What social problems lie in the ways we eat and how did a culture of obesity arise? How is food a medium in itself and how do we use it to communicate? These are all questions that beg to be answered.

John Stossel’s Blood is Full of Irony

"Because Geraldo's Mustache Can't Be Everywhere at Once"

Humorous though it may be, “Media Hype,” A 20/20 special featuring John Stossel, reiterated the need for greater media transparency amongst its own purveyors. For a segment that set out to clarify the presence of media hype and hoaxes, it certainly drummed up enough of its own. As each feature wore on, the media managed to perpetuate the emotional reporting, twisted truths, and paranoia that are prevalent across the news. The fact was then made clear that “specials” such as this shine an interrogative spotlight on various issues, begging them to confess to acts that may never even have been committed.