Boy Moms Spark Backlash By Teaching Their Little Boys To Cook Lasagna To Compete With Their Future Girlfriends
What's the real reason for their cooking lessons?
NDAB Creativity / Shutterstock “Boy Mom Culture” on TikTok is a trend sparked at the beginning of the pandemic showcasing the quirks of many family creators on the app. From relationship rules to parenting strategies, the TikTok moms have gained exposure through backlash several times in the past few years for how they treat their sons.
Recently, a trend of "Boy Mom" videos went viral, with moms posting videos teaching their sons to cook with captions that many found to be upsetting.
“Making sure my son can cook,” one video innocently starts, “so he’s not impressed with your daughter’s Stouffer’s lasagna.” The videos that follow are no less absurd — calling these potential girlfriends “dusty” and condemning the need for their son to compensate for their “lack of cooking”.
The TikTok trend captured 'boy moms' teaching their sons to cook — but for all the wrong reasons.
“Please tell me that you don’t feel insecure about girls that don’t even exist in your sons’ lives yet,” @soogia1 says in a Stitch of a few original videos from the trend.
Comments and stitch videos like Soogia’s above started to gain traction, calling out the strange behavior of some of these “Boy Moms.” Instead of focusing on the benefit of teaching their young children cooking skills, they call out the potential failings of their future girlfriends and wives — assuming that they’d be lacking in their abilities themselves.
The attitudes shown in the videos prompt a great deal of discourse ,calling out a lot of typical connotations of “Boy Moms” from other viral videos in the past few years. “Man, the ‘future wife’ is probably a little girl now and they’re still competing with her,” one comment jokes.
Although many commentors joke about it, the root of the discourse against these moms’ attitudes lies in a much deeper conversation — one that might fuel their outlandish relationships with their sons.
These moms posted videos criticizing their son’s non-existent girlfriends’ cooking choices, sparking misogynistic accusations.
“Setting this expectation that there’s this division of labor based on gender,” a TikToker says, “and if you find a woman that is ‘worthless’ and ‘toxic’ or ‘a hoochie’ then you’ll have to take care of yourself because she can’t… teach him to be independent.”
With sons under 10 years old, comments on the original video wonder why the mom’s are hyper-focused on their son’s potential girlfriends, with many calling them “insecure.”
Hyper-focused on their relationship with their boys, with an attitude of “they can do no wrong,” many people consider the moms’ videos to be misogynistic, with an inherent disgust for their “future girlfriends.”
Other moms posted rebuttal videos teaching their own sons, calling cooking a ‘life skill’ instead of a ‘woman’s obligation’.
“There are a million reasons to want to teach your sons to cook,” @soogia1 calls out in a TikTok rebuttal, “to be able to sustain themselves, to be independent, to try new things and experiment with new foods, to learn about other cultures…”
Creators like @theewilsons clap back to the original trend on TikTok, commenting on her reasoning for teaching her own sons to cook — one that hints at the perceived misogyny of the original videos.
“Teaching my son how to cook,” she captions the video, “so your daughters don't have to deal with a man that thinks cooking is a woman's job and not a life skill.”
Toxic ‘Boy Mom’ culture is not new, and many people blame absent fathers and toxic gender stereotypes.
“Boy Mom Culture” is not comprehensive of all moms, but many creators on TikTok call the tendency for creators on the app with sons to lean towards certain stereotypes.
Whether it be a “boys will be boys” excuse or a reinforcement of traditional masculine gender expression, many critics of “Boy Mom Culture” warn about these parenting approaches for the wellbeing of their children as they grow up.
So, outside of patriarchal stereotypes and gender hierarchies, what could truthfully be to blame for the rise in “Boy Mom Culture”?
Some creators suggest that absent or toxic fathers might be to blame for “Boy Mom Culture” and certain moms being overly invested in their relationship and protective natures with their sons.
Not receiving healthy attention from a spouse, mothers tend to look to their sons or other children to fill that void, often leading to an unhealthy relationship that can harm their children into adulthood.
So while seemingly absurd videos about teaching their sons to cook might go viral, it’s important for creators like these to also point out the toxicity that follows when the video ends.
Zayda Slabbekoorn is a news and entertainment writer at YourTango focusing on pop culture analysis and human interest stories.