About

Why Is Brooklyn BBQ Taking Over the World? refers to a widely-parodied tweet by Vice sub-site Munchies which asks the titular question and displays a picture of barbecue food from Brooklyn, New York. Many felt the picture of the food was unappetizing, leading to parodies where people posted variations of the text with absurd picture.

Origin

On March 4th, 2018, the Munchies Twitter account posted a link to an article on Brooklyn barbecue with the caption, "Why is Brooklyn barbecue taking over the world?"^[1] The account also provided a picture that featured some barbecued meat, bread rolls, pickles and beer on a tray. The tweet gained over 740 retweets and 3,100 likes (shown below). Notably, the tweet also received 9,000 replies, suggesting it fell under the law of The Ratio, which states that if a tweet gets significantly more replies than retweets and likes, it is a bad tweet.

Spread

Immediately after the tweet was posted, Twitter users commented that the food looked unappetizing. In particular, people from other parts of the world responded with pictures of their local version of barbecue. Twitter user @TravisReier posted a picture of barbecue from Austin, Texas that gained over 200 retweets and 3,600 likes (shown below, left). User @KCDeathMachine posted a video showing barbecue from Kansas City that gained 18 retweets and 258 likes (shown below, right). These types of responses were covered by The Daily Dot.^[2]

Other Twitter users joked by posting variations of the headline with different pictures. Twitter user @chrisopotamia posted a version with a picture of a Dorito and some shredded cheese, calling it "Brooklyn nachos," gaining over 4,300 retweets and 22,000 likes (shown below, left). Twitter user @SubMedina posted a picture of a cafeteria lunch tray, calling it "Brooklyn soul food," gaining over 250 retweets and 1,500 likes (shown below, right). These jokes were covered by Twitter Moments.^[3]

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References