Readers of the New York Times are slamming the paper for its “insensitive” use of chopsticks in a photo illustrating a story about an Asian steakhouse. Critics say the chopsticks show that the paper doesn’t understand Asian traditions.
Many on social media were incensed over the odd placement of chopsticks in a photo that originally accompanied a story about the restaurant Jade Sixty, a new eatery that is reportedly an “Asian-inspired” steak house, according to Huffington Post.
The photo shows two pairs of chopsticks, one set sticking out of a slab of steak meat and another poking up out of a dish of sliced meats.
https://twitter.com/wilfredchan/status/946105655626047489
Critics, though, slammed the paper noting that Asian traditions eschew leaving chopsticks poking up in the air because it is reminiscent of funerary practices and violates dining etiquette:
Food stylist doesn’t understand “chopstick placement”… proper do’s and don’t’s. Photo is “bad luck.”
— iamlinda ⌘ (@pica2pixel) December 28, 2017
https://twitter.com/wilfredchan/status/946105655626047489
Others wondered why anyone would be using chopsticks on a giant slab of steak in the first place:
am I supposed to eat the whole steak w/chopsticks??
— party squid (@vikicheung) December 28, 2017
Asians stick chopsticks under steaks as levers to catapult the meat into their mouths. Tres traditional.
— 🏴 (@jgriffiths) December 28, 2017
Indeed, some Twitters users even got upset at the use of the word “Asian” at all insisting that there are too many Asian countries to use such a catchall phrase:
Inspired by, like, ALL of Asia? I don’t see any Indian or Malaysian food on that table. Oh, I forgot. All of Asia is basically the same.
— HeiHei is bae (@pranishk) December 28, 2017
For its part, the Times removed the photo with the chopsticks but did not comment on the controversy.
Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston.
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