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Burger King’s cringey International Women’s Day tweet has people begging Burger Queen to take over

Burger King UK's awkward tweet on International Women's Day
Burger King UK's awkward tweet on International Women's Day Photo: Screenshot

“Burger Queen” is trending on Twitter as users chastise Burger King UK for a cringeworthy message sent on International Women’s Day. The tweet was intended to highlight an initiative to support female chefs, but it tried to be clever and failed spectacularly.

The tweet simply said, “Women belong in the kitchen.”

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“If they want to, of course,” the multi-tweet thread tagged with the #IWD hashtag continued. “Yet only 20% of chefs are women. We’re on a mission to change the gender ratio in the restaurant industry by empowering female employees with the opportunity to pursue a new career.”

“We are proud to be launching a new scholarship programme which will help female Burger King employees pursue their culinary dreams!”

Many users, however, only saw the first tweet. And they didn’t find it funny at all.

At first, the company defended the tweets, apparently not realizing how the campaign was being received.

“The best time to delete this post was immediately after posting it. The second best time is now,” KFC Gaming sent the company in a meme.

“Why would we delete a tweet that’s drawing attention to a huge lack of female representation in our industry, we thought you’d be on board with this as well? We’ve launched our scholarship to help give more of our female employees the chance to pursue a culinary career,” the fast food chain responded.

“idk probably because you’re attracting and validating sexist right-wing conspiracy theorists lol. but enjoy your free publicity I guess, BurgerKingUK,” one user responded.

“The engagement on your original tweet—which, again, is literally just a sexist trope—is 527% *higher* than the tweet announcing the scholarship program,” digital strategist Kendell Brown replied. “Way more people are seeing you validate sexism on #InternationalWomensDay than are learning about your scholarship program.”

It didn’t take long before the UK arm of the popular hamburger chain wised up and apologized.

With Burger King trending, other users quickly pointed out that maybe it was time to completely revamp the company. After all, if women belong in the kitchen, why isn’t the chain called Burger Queen?

“The age of the Burger King is over. The time of the Burger Queen has come,” Elyse Willems tweeted, racking up thousands of likes. “Shout-out to all my fellow Burger Queens on this #InternationalWomensDay! You can do and be whatever your heart desires!”

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