Bootleg activists take social media outrage to an all new level…over burritos.
Two white women from Portland, Oregon—Kali Wilgus and Liz Connelly—found themselves the targets of a social media mob acting as social justice warriors after the two appeared in a local paper featuring their pop-up burrito stand, Kooks Burritos. The women had been operating the cart on the weekends for several weeks without any trouble until they were profiled by a local newspaper called Willamette Week.
The women spoke about how they were inspired to go into business after a trip to Mexico. They were introduced to local food and began asking questions about the recipe, which the Mexican women were pretty hush about. They did, however, explain the basics to the women. Connelly told the newspaper, “I picked the brains of every tortilla lady there in the worst broken Spanish ever, and they showed me a little of what they did. They wouldn’t tell us too much about the technique, but we were peeking into the windows of every kitchen, totally fascinated by how easy they made it look. We learned quickly it isn’t quite that easy.”
Cue the fake social media outrage. While the women should have worded their interview better, users took advantage of the feature to completely obliterate them and their burrito stand online—refusing to take note of the part where the women explained how they were only able to recreate something close to the tortillas they had in Mexico after many hours of trial and error in their own kitchens. Less than two weeks after the article ran in Willamette Week, Kooks Burritos had shut down, and social justice warriors continued to bleed out over a burrito cart. Let that sink in for a minute. A burrito stand.
It’s not like the women were opening a huge fast food chain with poor imitation Mexican food that causes extreme gastrointestinal distress for many customers. That would be a complete and total mockery of the Mexican culture, wouldn’t it? Luckily, places like that don’t exist in the United States, right? Oh, hello Taco Bell—I didn’t see you sitting there.
The hypocrisy of these social justice warriors is louder than their call to action over a burrito stand operating only on the weekends. The fact of the matter is, Kooks Burritos was an easy target that many people knew could be bullied and intimidated. Why aren’t they going after Taco Bell or any other Mexican food chain?
The obsession with cultural appropriation is getting out of hand. With greater worries in the United States and much work to be done within minority communities, these bootleg activists think they’re doing a service to the cause by bullying white women into being afraid of selling Mexican food that was probably ten times more authentic than any chain offers. It’s food. With the amount of social media combat taken against Kooks Burritos, you would think the women hopped the border, low crawled into Abuela’s house, and videotaped her making tortillas while cackling about world domination. They’re burritos!
