A mukbang or meokbang ( ko, 먹방, ), also known as an eating show, is an online audiovisual broadcast in which a host consumes various quantities of food while interacting with the audience. It became popular in South Korea in 2010, and has since become a major contributor to Hallyu, along with K-Beauty,

K-pop K-pop (), short for Korean popular music, is a form of popular music originating in South Korea as part of South Korean culture. It includes styles and genres from around the world, such as pop, hip hop, R&B, experimental, rock, jazz, gos ...

, and

Korean drama Korean dramas (; RR: ''Han-guk deurama''), more popularly known as K-dramas, are television series in the Korean language, made in South Korea. They are popular worldwide, especially in Asia, partially due to the spread of Korean popular cultu ...

, earning its status as a global trend. Varieties of foods ranging from pizza to noodles are consumed in front of a camera. The purpose of mukbang is also sometimes educational, introducing viewers to regional specialities or gourmet spots. A mukbang is usually prerecorded or streamed live through a

webcast A webcast is a media presentation distributed over the Internet using streaming media technology to distribute a single content source to many simultaneous listeners/viewers. A webcast may either be distributed live or on demand. Essentially, web ...

streaming Streaming media is multimedia that is delivered and consumed in a continuous manner from a source, with little or no intermediate storage in network elements. ''Streaming'' refers to the delivery method of content, rather than the content it ...

platforms such as

AfreecaTV AfreecaTV ( ko, 아프리카TV, short for "Any FREE broadCAsting") () is a P2P technology-based video streaming service. It is now owned and operated by AfreecaTV Co., Ltd. in South Korea after Nowcom's AfreecaTV Co., Ltd and ZettaMedia split in ...

YouTube YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...

TikTok TikTok, known in China as Douyin (), is a short-form video hosting service owned by the Chinese company ByteDance. It hosts user-submitted videos, which can range in duration from 15 seconds to 10 minutes. TikTok is an international version ...

, and

Twitch Twitch may refer to: Biology * Muscle contraction ** Convulsion, rapid and repeated muscle contraction and relaxation ** Fasciculation, a small, local, involuntary muscle contraction ** Myoclonic twitch, a jerk usually caused by sudden muscle co ...

. In the live version, the mukbang host chats with the audience while the audience type in real-time in the live chat room. Eating shows are expanding their influence on internet broadcasting platforms and serve as a virtual community and a venue for active communication among internet users. Famous mukbangers in Asia and North America have gained popularity on social media and made mukbang a career with high income. By cooking and consuming food on camera for a large audience, mukbangers generate income from advertising, sponsorships, endorsements, as well as viewers' support. However, there has been growing criticism of mukbang's promotion of unhealthy eating habits,

animal cruelty Cruelty to animals, also called animal abuse, animal neglect or animal cruelty, is the infliction by omission (neglect) or by commission by humans of suffering or Injury, harm upon non-human animals. More narrowly, it can be the causing of harm ...

, and

food waste Food loss and waste is food that is not eaten. The causes of food waste or loss are numerous and occur throughout the food system, during production, processing, distribution, retail and food service sales, and consumption. Overall, about o ...

Etymology

The word mukbang () is a

portmanteau A portmanteau word, or portmanteau (, ) is a blend of words It would thus be morphologically comparable to "''eat

cast Cast may refer to: Music * Cast (band), an English alternative rock band * Cast (Mexican band), a progressive Mexican rock band * The Cast, a Scottish musical duo: Mairi Campbell and Dave Francis * ''Cast'', a 2012 album by Trespassers William * ...

''/eatshow", if that word were to exist in English. In 2020, the word was shortlisted for the word of the year competition organized by Collins dictionaries.

Historical background

Korea Korea ( ko, 한국, or , ) is a peninsular region in East Asia. Since 1945, it has been divided at or near the 38th parallel, with North Korea (Democratic People's Republic of Korea) comprising its northern half and South Korea (Republic o ...

has traditionally had a food culture based on healthy eating practices and strict

etiquette Etiquette () is the set of norms of personal behaviour in polite society, usually occurring in the form of an ethical code of the expected and accepted social behaviours that accord with the conventions and norms observed and practised by a ...

. However, a new food culture has emerged in Korea characterized by internet eating culture (mukbang). First introduced on the real-time internet TV service

in 2009, it now has become a trend in cable channels as well as terrestrial broadcasting. This form of programming emphasizes the attractiveness of the person who prepares the food. Eating and cooking shows are becoming effective programs for broadcasting companies as production costs are lower than reality entertainment programs. In each broadcast, a host will interact with their viewers through

online chat Online chat may refer to any kind of communication over the Internet that offers a real-time text, real-time transmission of text-based, text messages from sender to receiver. Chat messages are generally short in order to enable other participa ...

rooms. Many hosts generate revenue through mukbang by accepting donations or partnering with advertising networks. The popularity of mukbang streams has spread outside of Korea, with online streamers doing their own mukbang streams in other countries. In 2016,

introduced new categories like "social eating" to spotlight them. An article in ''

The Economist ''The Economist'' is a British weekly newspaper printed in demitab format and published digitally. It focuses on current affairs, international business, politics, technology, and culture. Based in London, the newspaper is owned by The Econo ...

'' contended that the popularity of eating shows can be attributed in part to the widespread anxiety and unhappiness in Koreans due to their country's long-term economic slump. Articles about mukbang have also appeared in ''

The Huffington Post ''HuffPost'' (formerly ''The Huffington Post'' until 2017 and sometimes abbreviated ''HuffPo'') is an American progressive news website, with localized and international editions. The site offers news, satire, blogs, and original content, and ...

'' and ''

The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

''. The Korean word for eating show, "mukbang," has been widely adopted in other types of eating shows, such as those featuring ASMR on platforms such as

. This eating performance from South Korea has also rapidly spread in influence and popularity to other Asian countries such as Japan and China. In China, mukbang is called "Chibo"; hosts make their content into short videos and

vlog A video blog or video log, sometimes shortened to vlog (), is a form of blog for which the medium is video. Vlog entries often combine embedded video (or a video link) with supporting text, images, and other metadata. Entries can be recorded in ...

s and upload them onto social media platforms like Weibo.

Culture

Mukbang emerged from a solo-eating population in South Korea, that found entertainment in watching actors and actresses eating in TV shows and movies. The contrast to the traditional eating culture that revolves around eating from the same communal dishes at the family dinner table has been acknowledged. It has been suggested one can vicariously satisfy the desire for food by viewing. In Korea, individuals who stream mukbang are called

broadcast jockey An online streamer or live streamer is a person who broadcasts themselves online through a live stream to an audience. History Streaming arose in the early 2010s, originating on sites like YouTube where users could upload videos of themselves i ...

s (BJs). As a result, high level of interaction BJ-to-viewer and viewer-to-viewer contributes to the sociability aspect of producing and consuming mukbang content. For example, during broadcast jockey, Changhyun's interaction with his audience he temporarily paused to follow a fan's directions on what to eat next and how to eat it. Viewers may influence the direction of the stream but the BJ retains control over what he or she eats.

Ventriloquism Ventriloquism, or ventriloquy, is a performance act of stagecraft in which a person (a ventriloquist) creates the illusion that their voice is coming from elsewhere, usually a puppeteered prop known as a "dummy". The act of ventriloquism is ve ...

, by which BJs mime the actions of their fans by directing food to the camera in a feeding motion and eating in their stead, is another technique that creates the illusion of a shared experience in one room. A study conducted by

Seoul National University Seoul National University (SNU; ) is a national public research university located in Seoul, South Korea. Founded in 1946, Seoul National University is largely considered the most prestigious university in South Korea; it is one of the three "S ...

found that within a two-year time frame (April 2017 to April 2019) the term "mukbang" was used in over 100,000 videos from YouTube. It reported that alleviating the feelings of

loneliness Loneliness is an unpleasant emotional response to perceived isolation. Loneliness is also described as social paina psychological mechanism which motivates individuals to seek social connections. It is often associated with a perceived lack ...

associated with eating alone may be the primary reason for mukbang's popularity. In a pilot study from February 2022 on mukbang-watching and mental health, psychologists lay the foundation for future investigation into the potential detriments of using mukbang, or virtual eating, as a substitute for social experiences. Another reason for mukbang viewing could be its potential sexual appeal. Researchers have argued that mukbangs can be viewed to satisfy eating-related fetishes, and have commented on the sexualized gaze brought about by watching hosts in such a private and intimate state. Mukbang has also been described as a multi-sensory experience and compared to a similar carnal video type,

pornography Pornography (often shortened to porn or porno) is the portrayal of sexual subject matter for the exclusive purpose of sexual arousal. Primarily intended for adults,

. It has been proposed that strict regulation on pornography and sexual material in Korea could be a contributing factor to the popularity of mukbang. Researchers liken the reduced satisfaction of eating from fervid viewership of mukbang to the diminished satisfaction of sex from overconsumption of pornography. Other studies argue that individuals who watch mukbang do so for entertainment, as an escape from reality, or to get satisfaction from the ASMR aspects of mukbang such as the eating sounds and sensations.Adema, Pauline. "Vicarious consumption: Food, television and the ambiguity of modernity." The Journal of American Culture 23.3 (2000): 113.

Varieties

A popular sub-genre of the trend is "cook-bang" show, in which the streamer includes the preparation and cooking of the dishes featured as part of the show. South Korean video game players have sometimes broadcast mukbang as breaks during their overall streams. The popularity of this practice among local users led the video game streaming service

to begin trialing a dedicated "social eating" category in July 2016; a representative of the service stated that this category is not necessarily specific to mukbang, but would leave the concept open to interpretation by streamers within its guidelines.

Media platforms

AfreecaTV

The typical eating show broadcast jockeys (BJ) on AfreecaTV are Bumfrica, Shuki, Mbro, Changhyun, Wangju, etc.

Twitch

added a new "social eating" item to its channel list in July 2016. Famous streamers include ImAllexx, Ameliabrador, and Simple Life on Air.

YouTube

Many people are famous for making these type of videos on

, including ip zalboon hetnim, Hamzy, Nado, and heebab. There are numerous others, including users who make videos of themselves eating in their daily lives.

Content creators in Asia

Mukbang broadcasts typically feature a solo eater (or with friends) who would usually eat in large portions along with a few other dishes. Most of these creators would cook their own food and show it in their content. Although traditional Korean food is the main food for these videos, fast food or junk food has also been popularly trending.

Banzz

At one time, Banzz had 3.08 million YouTube subscribers and held the number one spot among the mukbang streamers. In March 2020, his channel was at just over 2.5 million subscribers. Banzz is a typical example of mukbang. Banzz had been featured on AfreecaTV, including the 2016 Afreeca Grand Prix, but turned to YouTube as his platform after controversies at AfreecaTV. He was assessed a penalty for breaking contracts with AfreecaTV and appeared on

JTBC JTBC (shortened from ''Joongang Tongyang Broadcasting Company'' (; stylized as jtbc) is a South Korean nationwide pay television network. Its primary shareholder is JoongAng Holdings, with a 25% stake. It was launched on 1 December 2011. JTBC ...

's program Lanseon Life. He is noted for eating extreme amounts of food during mukbangs, and nevertheless maintains a muscular figure in the videos, saying he exercises an average of eight hours a day for health. His mukbang show includes Hongdae monster

Jajangmyeon ''Jajangmyeon'' () or ''jjajangmyeon'' () is a Korean noodle dish topped with a thick sauce made of '' chunjang'', diced pork, and vegetables. Variants of the dish use seafood, or other meats. History ''Jajangmyeon'' was introduced in the la ...

, fast-eating of 10 hamburgers, and Jajangmyeon mukbang.

Mbro

Mbro, short for Monster Brothers, is a mukbang BJ on AfreecaTV and YouTube. Mbro started broadcasting in April 2015. Mbro has over 900,000 YouTube subscribers, ranking second in the BJ popularity ranking in AfreecaTV a year after it started broadcasting, and emerging as a star of the mukbang industry with the AfreecaTV newcomer award.

Shugi

Shugi broadcasts most nights of the week. Her trademark is rapidly eating up to four spicy rice cakes in a single mouthful. Shugi's mukbang show is also famous for its sensory performance. She is good at using her lively facial expression and describing the food and her feelings. Her way of doing mukbang easily caused the consensus from the viewers. For example, she once described the sound of grilling meat to resemble the sound of rain, which made the video more engaging to the audience. Also, the fact that her video background is clean and light is only given to her and the food makes the audience focus only on her mukbang and won't be distracted by the background. She started broadcasting in May 2014 and won the AfreecaTV BJ Festival Rookie of the Year award. Since then, she has won all of the BJ's awards from 2015 to 2017 and is currently second place in the rankings of AfreecaTV's eating shows.

DKD

DKD, consisting of the brothers DK and KD, is a channel with 2.89 million subscribers on

. It is especially famous for ASMR broadcasting "real sound". In general, the food is done by BJ eating food while chatting with viewers in real-time. But the real sound is said to be a good thing to eat in a short video of about 20 minutes, especially when food is eaten. It is also famous for eating foods that are not common at tables such as

sugarcane Sugarcane or sugar cane is a species of (often hybrid) tall, Perennial plant, perennial grass (in the genus ''Saccharum'', tribe Andropogoneae) that is used for sugar Sugar industry, production. The plants are 2–6 m (6–20 ft) tall with ...

aloe ''Aloe'' (; also written ''Aloë'') is a genus containing over 650 species of flowering succulent plants.WFO (2022): Aloe L. Published on the Internet;http://www.worldfloraonline.org/taxon/wfo-4000001341. Accessed on: 06 Nov 2022 The most wid ...

, and honey as well as Korean general foods such as

chicken The chicken (''Gallus gallus domesticus'') is a domesticated junglefowl species, with attributes of wild species such as the grey and the Ceylon junglefowl that are originally from Southeastern Asia. Rooster or cock is a term for an adult m ...

tteokbokki (), or simmered rice cake, is a popular Korean food made from small-sized (long, white, cylinder-shaped rice cakes) called (; "rice cake noodles") or commonly (; " rice cakes"). * Eomuk (fish cakes), boiled eggs, and scallions are some comm ...

Yuka Kinoshita

Yuka Kinoshita is a Japanese YouTuber and competitive eater. Career Yuka Kinoshita began posting on her eating-focused YouTube channel since 2014, five years after her debut in Japanese competitive eating competitions. Kinoshita uploads daily videos in whic ...

is a

YouTuber A YouTuber is an online personality and/or influencer who produces videos on the video-sharing platform YouTube, typically posting to their personal YouTube channel. The term was first used in the English language in 2006. Influence Influent ...

who works in Japan with 5.15 million subscribers. Known as a "big eater" or "oogui" (Japanese: 大食い, おおぐい), she uploads daily mukbang videos where she consumes large portions of food. She made her debut in the 2009 Japan Eating Contest, and since 2014 she has started her own mukbang videos on her YouTube channel. In one of her videos, Yuka ate 137 Philippine bananas and caused controversy among Chinese viewers. Many Chinese netizens accused her of assaulting China using that 137 bananas because there are 1.37 billion people in China and this episode was posted soon after the South China Sea Ruling. However, there are also Chinese netizens that don't see this as a problem. Though YouTube is not available in mainland China, Yuka still has lots of Chinese fans since she established her own Weibo account where she has 2.66 million followers and 130,000 viewers when live streaming.

Western versions

Several American YouTubers have become popular with their own version of mukbang. The concept is similar to the one of eastern versions, with an online audiovisual broadcast in which a host eats large amounts of food. However, in most western versions, hosts do not do their mukbangs live like Korean mukbangers and instead resort to pre-recorded and edited videos posted on platforms like YouTube. Often, the amounts of food eaten are also larger than most of their Asian counterparts. In addition, a lot of western hosts focus on the ASMR aspects of a mukbang broadcast. Finally, western mukbangs also usually involve the host describing the food they eat and talking through their meal; this is not very common in live eastern mukbangs.

Content creators in North America

Keemi

Keemi is an American mukbanger on YouTube who, as of June 2022, has garnered 895 thousand subscribers on her channel. Her channel features cooking and eating videos. Known for cooking in her college dorm and her

Chicago (''City in a Garden''); I Will , image_map = , map_caption = Interactive Map of Chicago , coordinates = , coordinates_footnotes = , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name ...

apartment, Keemi's content also includes ASMR and food-vlog style videos.

Stephanie Soo

Stephanie Soo is an American mukbanger and a YouTuber who includes conspiracy theories and crime stories in her mukbang videos. Soo's channel had 2.45 million subscribers in April 2021.

Nikocado Avocado

Nikocado Avocado Nicholas Perry (born May 19, 1992), known online as Nikocado Avocado, is a Ukrainian-born American Internet celebrity best known for his ''mukbang'' videos on YouTube. , he has accumulated more than 7 million subscribers and approximately 1.8 ...

(real name Nicolas Perry) is an American mukbanger who, as of June 2022 has garnered over 3.2 million subscribers on his (main) YouTube channel. Perry began his YouTube channel in 2014 as a vegan vlogger, but gave up

veganism Veganism is the practice of abstaining from the use of animal product—particularly in diet—and an associated philosophy that rejects the commodity status of animals. An individual who follows the diet or philosophy is known as a vegan. ...

, citing health issues. He has gained wide spread attention for consuming excessive amounts of food, as well as frequent emotional outbursts in his videos. His on-camera behavior has led to Perry being involved in multiple controversies, as well as leaving many of his viewers expressing their concerns over Perry's mental health. According to Perry's interview with '' MEL Magazine'', his online conflicts are self-orchestrated for the benefit of his career, citing his past education in

performance arts Performance art is an artwork or art exhibition created through actions executed by the artist or other participants. It may be witnessed live or through documentation, spontaneously developed or written, and is traditionally presented to a pu ...

and his desire to play the role of the

villain A villain (also known as a "black hat" or "bad guy"; the feminine form is villainess) is a stock character, whether based on a historical narrative or one of literary fiction. ''Random House Unabridged Dictionary'' defines such a character a ...

Bethany Gaskin

Bethany Gaskin has multiple YouTube channels and has amassed a following of over 3 million subscribers on the platform. Gaskin specializes in

seafood Seafood is any form of sea life regarded as food by humans, prominently including fish and shellfish. Shellfish include various species of molluscs (e.g. bivalve molluscs such as clams, oysters and mussels, and cephalopods such as octopus an ...

mukbangs. Like other Western mukbangs, many of Gaskin's videos focus on the ASMR aspect of eating food online with viewers watching her videos to relax and receive "brain tingles". Gaskin is one of the highest-grossing Western mukbangers making money through sponsorships, as well as from the sales of her own secret "Smackalicious" sauce.

Veronica Wang

Veronica Wang is a Canadian mukbanger with 1.78 million followers on YouTube. Characterized as always having make-up on, she cooks and eats different types of food around the world on camera, ranging from

Ethiopian Ethiopians are the native inhabitants of Ethiopia, as well as the global diaspora of Ethiopia. Ethiopians constitute several component ethnic groups, many of which are closely related to ethnic groups in neighboring Eritrea and other parts of ...

injera Injera (, ; om, Biddeena; ) is a sour fermented pancake-like flatbread with a slightly spongy texture, traditionally made of teff flour. In Ethiopia, Eritrea, and some parts of Sudan, injera is the staple. Injera is central to the dining p ...

, Korean fried cheese balls, to Italian

spaghetti bolognese Bolognese sauce (, ; known in Italian as ''ragù alla bolognese'', , ''ragù bolognese'', or simply ''ragù'') is a meat-based sauce in Italian cuisine, typical of the city of Bologna. It is customarily used to dress ''tagliatelle al ragù'' and ...

Monetization

Mukbangers incurring income from such videos can earn from advertising. This performance of eating can allow top broadcasters to earn as much as $10,000 a month which does not include sponsorships. Live-streaming platforms like AfreecaTV and Twitch allow viewers to send payments to their favorite streamers. Creators can also earn income through endorsements, e-books, and product reviews. Bethany Gaskin, under the name Bloveslife for her channel, has made over $1 million from advertising on her videos as reported by ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

''. Soo Tang, also known as MommyTang on YouTube, is a mukbanger with 490,000 subscribers on her channel. In an interview with ''Today Food'', Tang claimed that successful mukbangers can earn about $100,000 in a year.

Criticism

Promotion of unhealthy eating habits

The volume of food and the manner of its consumption in mukbang has been criticized for normalizing and glorifying

gluttony Gluttony ( la, gula, derived from the Latin ''gluttire'' meaning "to gulp down or swallow") means over-indulgence and over-consumption of food, drink, or wealth items, particularly as status symbols. In Christianity, it is considered a sin if ...

overeating Overeating occurs when an individual consumes more calories in relation to the energy that is expended via physical activity or expelled via excretion, leading to weight gain and often obesity. Overeating is the defining characteristic of binge e ...

. In July 2018, the

South Korean government The Government of South Korea is the union government of the South Korea, Republic of Korea, created by the Constitution of South Korea as the executive, legislative and judicial authority of the republic. The president acts as the head of sta ...

announced that it would create and regulate mukbang guidelines by launching the "National Obesity Management Comprehensive Measures". The Ministry of Health and Welfare announced the measures, which were intended to address

binge eating Binge eating is a pattern of disordered eating which consists of episodes of uncontrollable eating. It is a common symptom of eating disorders such as binge eating disorder and bulimia nervosa. During such binges, a person rapidly consumes an ex ...

and harm to the public

health Health, according to the World Health Organization, is "a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease and infirmity".World Health Organization. (2006)''Constitution of the World Health Organiza ...

caused by mukbang. Criticisms were levied against the ministry: the

Blue House Cheong Wa Dae ( ko, 청와대; Hanja: ; ), also known as the Blue House, is a public park that formerly served as the executive office and official residence of the president of South Korea from 1948 to 2022. It is located in the Jongno distr ...

petition board received about 40 petitions against mukbang regulations, which maintained arguments such as "there is no correlation between mukbang and binge eating" and "the government is infringing on individual freedom." A study, which investigated the popularity of mukbang and its health impacts on the public, analyzed media coverage, articles, and YouTube video content related to "mukbang" and concluded that people who frequently watch mukbang may be more susceptible to adopting poor eating habits. In a survey involving 380 non-nutrition majors at a university in

Gyeonggi Province Gyeonggi-do (, ) is the most populous province in South Korea. Its name, ''Gyeonggi'', means "京 (the capital) and 畿 (the surrounding area)". Thus, ''Gyeonggi-do'' can be translated as "Seoul and the surrounding areas of Seoul". Seoul, the na ...

, and their tendencies to watch mukbang and its close variant, cookbang, a significant 29.1% of frequent mukbang-watchers self-diagnosed negative habits, such as increased intake of processed and delivered foods or eating out. Mukbang has also been credited as a dietary restriction device for curbing food cravings and excessive watching may be correlated with the exacerbation or relapse of

eating disorder An eating disorder is a mental disorder defined by abnormal eating behaviors that negatively affect a person's physical or mental health. Only one eating disorder can be diagnosed at a given time. Types of eating disorders include binge eating d ...

s. A netnographic analysis of popular mukbang videos on YouTube revealed a significant number of viewer comments expressing fascination with the ability to remain thin after ingesting large amounts of unhealthy foods, and a major subcategory of which attempted to explain this phenomenon by naming medical mysteries, sourcing Asian ethnicity, as well as providing anecdotal evidence. BJs' experiences with

fat shaming Social stigma of obesity is broadly defined as bias or discrimination, discriminatory behaviors targeted at overweight and obese individuals because of their weight. Such social stigmas can span one's entire life, as long as excess weight is pr ...

and their underweight counterparts' with speculation for purging and engaging in other unhealthy eating habits off-camera were also noted. In 2019, mukbanger Nicholas Perry, known as Nikocado Avocado, shared that the amount of

from mukbang has taken a toll on his health, leading to issues such as

erectile dysfunction Erectile dysfunction (ED), also called impotence, is the type of sexual dysfunction in which the penis fails to become or stay erect during sexual activity. It is the most common sexual problem in men.Cunningham GR, Rosen RC. Overview of male ...

, frequent

diarrhea Diarrhea, also spelled diarrhoea, is the condition of having at least three loose, liquid, or watery bowel movements each day. It often lasts for a few days and can result in dehydration due to fluid loss. Signs of dehydration often begin wi ...

, and

gaining weight Weight gain is an increase in body weight. This can involve an increase in muscle mass, fat deposits, excess fluids such as water or other factors. Weight gain can be a symptom of a serious medical condition. Description Weight gain occurs w ...

. In August 2021, Italian mukbanger Omar Palermo, also known as YouTubo Anche Io, died from a heart attack.

Food wastage

Excessive amounts of food are consumed and wasted during mukbang. Some mukbangers chew food and then spit it out, but edit their videos to remove the spitting, so as to create the false impression that a large volume of food has been consumed. A YouTube mukbanger called Moon Bok Hee was criticized for this practice. In 2020, General Secretary of the

Chinese Communist Party The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), officially the Communist Party of China (CPC), is the founding and One-party state, sole ruling party of the China, People's Republic of China (PRC). Under the leadership of Mao Zedong, the CCP emerged victoriou ...

Xi Jinping Xi Jinping ( ; ; ; born 15 June 1953) is a Chinese politician who has served as the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC), and thus as the paramount leader of China, s ...

launched the 'Clean Plate' campaign, calling on the nation to guard against food waste. This campaign prompted state-run media outlets such as

CCTV Closed-circuit television (CCTV), also known as video surveillance, is the use of video cameras to transmit a signal to a specific place, on a limited set of monitors. It differs from broadcast television in that the signal is not openly t ...

to run reports critical of mukbangers. Users on several Chinese apps received warnings about their mukbang contents and faced an influx of negative comments. Later,

Douyin TikTok, known in China as Douyin (), is a short-form video hosting service owned by the Chinese company ByteDance. It hosts user-submitted videos, which can range in duration from 15 seconds to 10 minutes. TikTok is an international version ...

promised to have stricter verification on food-related videos. Other media platforms, including

Bilibili Bilibili (stylized bilibili), nicknamed B Site, is a video sharing website based in Shanghai where users can submit, view and add overlaid commentary on videos. Since the mid-2010s, Bilibili began to expand to a broader audience from its origi ...

and

Kuaishou Kuaishou ( zh, c=快手, l=quick hand) is a users video sharing, short video-sharing mobile app, a social network, and video special effects editor, based in Haidian District (Beijing), developed in 2011 by Beijing Kuaishou Technology, by engineer ...

, have encouraged not wasting food.

Incidents of animal cruelty

Ssoyoung, a popular mukbang streamer, has received attention and much criticism for inflicting cruelty to living sea creatures before and during their consumption in her mukbang videos. Examples of live animals subjected to prolonged bodily harm while alive include

fish Fish are aquatic, craniate, gill-bearing animals that lack limbs with digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and cartilaginous and bony fish as well as various extinct related groups. Approximately 95% of li ...

shark Sharks are a group of elasmobranch fish characterized by a cartilaginous skeleton, five to seven gill slits on the sides of the head, and pectoral fins that are not fused to the head. Modern sharks are classified within the clade Selachimo ...

crab Crabs are decapod crustaceans of the infraorder Brachyura, which typically have a very short projecting "tail" (abdomen) ( el, βραχύς , translit=brachys = short, / = tail), usually hidden entirely under the thorax. They live in all the ...

squid True squid are molluscs with an elongated soft body, large eyes, eight arms, and two tentacles in the superorder Decapodiformes, though many other molluscs within the broader Neocoleoidea are also called squid despite not strictly fitting t ...

, and

octopus An octopus ( : octopuses or octopodes, see below for variants) is a soft-bodied, eight- limbed mollusc of the order Octopoda (, ). The order consists of some 300 species and is grouped within the class Cephalopoda with squids, cuttle ...

es, and include an incident where Ssoyoung poured

table salt Salt is a mineral composed primarily of sodium chloride (NaCl), a chemical compound belonging to the larger class of salts; salt in the form of a natural crystalline mineral is known as rock salt or halite. Salt is present in vast quantitie ...

onto a basin of live eels, and an incident where squids had their mantles cut off, but were kept alive before having

soy sauce Soy sauce (also called simply soy in American English and soya sauce in British English) is a liquid condiment of Chinese origin, traditionally made from a fermented paste of soybeans, roasted grain, brine, and '' Aspergillus oryzae'' or ''Asp ...

poured over their exposed nerves, inflicting excessive pain and suffering to the animals. Korean viewers also criticized Ssoyoung for claiming that some of her "exotic" meals were normal in Korean cuisine and culture.

Health impact

As the food consumption of influencers adversely affect the food consumption of viewers, watching Mukbang videos leave their viewers at a risk of being unhealthy or affect their health significantly badly. RackaRacka_on_Cold_Ones

A study in 2021 which addressed the problem of Mukbang and the effect of food consumption of influencers on their viewers' shows that affected individuals are susceptible to disorders such as anorexia nervosa, bulimia nervosa, and binge eating disorder. A sulbang(

Korean Korean may refer to: People and culture * Koreans, ethnic group originating in the Korean Peninsula * Korean cuisine * Korean culture * Korean language **Korean alphabet, known as Hangul or Chosŏn'gŭl **Korean dialects and the Jeju language ** ...

:술방, pronounced ulpaŋ or eating show with alcohol videos can be watched by anyone including minors, which may inadvertently stimulate alcohol consumption among teenagers. Watching Mukbang videos often create intimacy between the mukbanger and the viewer, and it could increase the likelihood of solo-dining of viewers.

References

External links

* {{Broadcasting Articles containing video clips Eating behaviors Entertainment in South Korea Food and drink television Streaming television

Etymology

Historical background

Culture

Varieties

Media platforms

AfreecaTV

Twitch

YouTube

Content creators in Asia

Banzz

Mbro

Shugi

DKD

Yuka Kinoshita

Western versions

Content creators in North America

Keemi

Stephanie Soo

Nikocado Avocado

Bethany Gaskin

Veronica Wang

Monetization

Criticism

Promotion of unhealthy eating habits

Food wastage

Incidents of animal cruelty

Health impact

See also

References

External links