A vegan says a hotpot looks like leftover dishwater, gets called an “engorged penis”

Today, we are not only monitored by physical law enforcers to uphold security but are also surrounded by “social norms police” watching our every move, thanks to social media. Australian guitarist, Jona Weinhofen, is an excellent case and point of what a “harmless” post can do. In a tweet on December 27, he posted a picture of a Chinese hotpot with the caption: Meat eaters be like “vegan food looks and tastes gross” And then eat something that looks like leftover dishwater. The actual tweet below: https://twitter.com/jonaweinhofen/status/1078512183393148928 The alarms have definitely been set off and in a matter of hours, he is the centre of intense criticism. The tweet now has over 2000 comments, 300 retweets and 1900 likes (or dislikes). Asians, meat-lovers, and vegans alike are expressing their opinions and a tweet war has been started. Apparently, a large number of Asians were “insulted” by the tweet. Talk about being in a hot pot. Luckily, there are some netizens who are taking the side of the guitarist by saying that there are hotpots that really look like leftover dishwater and there was nothing culturally offensive or racist with what he said. [caption id="attachment_114290" align="aligncenter" width="946"] Photo: Facebook screengrab[/caption] Dinesh Bora might be shaking his head at all the “sensitive people”. His comment was backed up by Kuah Sing Yee and the latter even added that the affected race is not exempt from racism. [caption id="attachment_114286" align="aligncenter" width="958"] Photo: Facebook screengrab[/caption] Tweet creativity Back in Twitter, where it all started, we see a myriad of responses such as: [caption id="attachment_114288" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Photo: Twitter screengrab[/caption] Leave it to a meme to describe how Jona must be feeling right now: [caption id="attachment_114285" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Photo: Twitter screengrab[/caption] It would seem that even the @Racism Watchdog was alerted and this is his response on the incident: [caption id="attachment_114287" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Photo: Twitter screengrab[/caption] Perhaps the winner and deserving recipient of the “most creative rebuttal” award should go to @Jeff Yang with his tweet: https://twitter.com/originalspin/status/1079027071395991552 Yes, it got messy. But was the tweet actually racist or even meant to be racist or not?