Eat Like a Girl

Dear Readers,

I wanted to bring this to your attention in case you, too, have been upset by seemingly "small" ways that our girls are told that being who they are is a pejorative.   If you see something like I describe in my letter below, please speak up!  And if you feel thus inclined on this issue, please write Cubby's and let them know it bothers you too or blog/tweet/post about it with the hashtag #EatLikeAGirl #LikeAGirl

February 11, 2015

Cubby's Chicago Beef

1258 North State Street

Provo, Utah 84604

Dear Cubby's,

I had the great experience of discovering your restaurant last week in Provo.  The servers were polite and friendly.  The food was wonderful.  The atmosphere was fun.  The menu wall was engaging and infuriating.  I know you’ve heard about this before because when I posted the following picture (see below) on my Facebook page one of my friends said that she complains about it every time she goes to Cubby's.  I’m talking about the designation of the levels of spiciness as “girl, boy and man.”  Yes, I know it is meant to be in keeping with the fun loving atmosphere of the restaurant.  It was a joke.  We should all just laugh it off or, if it really bugs us, go eat somewhere else.  But I really like your food and I’d like to keep eating there.  In order to do that, I can’t just remain silent on this issue.  It bothers me that it is still considered ok to characterize women and girls, across the board, as being less than or weaker than men.  There are a hundred other fun-loving ways to designate the levels of spiciness of the food.  Why was this designation chosen?  What message is it sending?  Yes, this is one tiny little thing.  But our girls are bombarded with tiny little things that define them as less than.  The weight of all of these tiny little things adds up.  As we saw in the excellent Always commercial during the Super Bowl, young girls don’t recognize being a girl is a pejorative until we teach them it’s a pejorative.  Please don’t be one of the voices teaching my daughters that to be who they are is the weakest thing on the menu.

Marianne Hales Harding