Gather ‘Round, Everyone. A Man Wants to Tell Us How to Fix Hooters.

The latest entry on the long list of industries and businesses killed by those damn millennials is Hooters, the restaurant that lets you eat mediocre wings in a strip mall while staring at women’s cleavage. According to an article at Complex, drawing data from PornHub searches, the younger generations just aren’t as into breasts as their baby boomer predecessors. So the company is shutting down a number of locations and restrategizing.

First off, the idea that it’s millennials’ disinterest in breasts that’s killing Hooters is ridiculous. More likely, it’s the fact that Hooters is an outdated, overpriced business rooted solely in objectification. Millennials have largely destigmatized porn, they have online dating, they’re waiting longer to get married, and they have less money on average than their parents and grandparents. What part of that leads anyone to choose Hooters as their go-to lunch spot?

But even worse than Hooters blaming millennials’ war on breasts for their creepy, dated restaurant’s lack of business is the dude on Twitter who took it upon himself to “fix” Hooters.

Eric Adam Hovis there turned that lengthy thread into a blog post, the better to streamline all the awful ideas, I guess. The ideas were so awful, Hovis has edited his short terrible piece (which you can still read here) into a much lengthier terrible piece after getting what I can only assume was a firestorm of … let’s be kind and say “feedback.”

Let’s break down this original post, because while it has since been edited, it is still a carnival of entitlement.

To start, he lets us know his two main points:

(image: screengrab)

That first point has since been edited to explain that he thinks Hooters should have more diversity and body-positivity. Which might be a fine point if “body positivity” didn’t rest on tearing down a specific type of woman.

As for that second point, hoo boy, strap in. He starts off by proposing that Hooters could have a “debate night.” I am not exaggerating when I say that that is one of the worst ideas I’ve ever heard. I had a visceral reaction to reading those words, and it was not pleasant. The waitresses of Hooters and any other “breastaurant” already have to deal with gross leering men and pretend to enjoy their company in exchange for a kept job and what are hopefully increased tips.

Now imagine forcing these women to not just listen to, but actively engage with those same men, shouting their opinions at them like a drunken, gropey “Change My Mind” meme come to life, with the out-of-whack power dynamic of a tip in play. I think I just threw up in my mouth.

Almost as bad as the idea of debate night (j/k, nothing will ever be as bad as debate night) is the suggestion that there should be “some specialized setup for the guys who just want to therapeutically vent their woes to women,” “especially if they’ve been drinking.” He calls these women “specialized ‘problem listener’ hostesses.” He couches this by suggesting those women will take some of the emotional labor of dealing with drunk over-sharers off of the waitresses. But … who in the world would take that hostess job? You might be saying to yourself, at least they’ll be paid well, right? NOPE!

Hovis says that with all of this, “I think I’m thinking of a geisha place,” and sure, what he’s talking about is similar to that, although with Hooters’ hypersexualization of its employees (even though no one thinks they’re getting sex when they walk into a Hooters), it might be closer to a courtesan or even that “Girlfriend Experience” made famous by Steven Soderbergh and Showtime: an intelligent, witty, sexy woman whose goal is to make the men around them feel seen and special and turned on. But what do all of those experiences with those specific types of women have in common? They’re really fucking expensive.

But, he says, “Oh, and somehow Hooters would need to be SUPER CHEAP since us millennials are BROKE.”

So, let’s get this straight. This guy’s ideal version of Hooters has women tailored to his specific physical type, is highly educated and witty, willing to be a therapist/debate sparring partner, and also working for basically the tips customers definitely aren’t leaving, because if you feel entitled to this kind of woman, you probably feel insulted at the idea of having to pay extra for her company. She should just do this for fun! For the experience!

It’s bad enough to blame an entire generation for not having the exact tastes of their parents, especially when those tastes are centered around not-great food and forced interactions with scantily-clad women. If someone is looking to improve that setting (or to describe the type of establishment they would rather visit, as Hovis clarified was his intent), let’s not demand more emotional labor from women for less money. I definitely hope that’s not going to be the next generation’s legacy.

Especially not when the real solution to fix Hooters was right there.

(featured image: Rusty Clark / flickr)

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Vivian Kane

Vivian Kane (she/her) is the Senior News Editor at The Mary Sue, where she's been writing about politics and entertainment (and all the ways in which the two overlap) since the dark days of late 2016. Born in San Francisco and radicalized in Los Angeles, she now lives in Kansas City, Missouri, where she gets to put her MFA to use covering the local theatre scene. She is the co-owner of The Pitch, Kansas City’s alt news and culture magazine, alongside her husband, Brock Wilbur, with whom she also shares many cats.

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