Chef Tini Is Disrespected, but The Internet Rides For Her

Chef Tineke "Tini" Younger has taken the world by storm with her shockingly good cooking. Shockingly, because Tini is only 22 years old, and has already made her name in the world of cooking stars. With 8.1 million followers on TikTok alone, Tini's meteoric rise doesn't look like it will be slowing down anytime soon.

Although the youthful chef knows her way around the kitchen and consistently puts out delicious-looking dishes, her presence in the cooking world is not without controversy. Some people are hung up on Tini's age, while others criticize her diminutive stature and "baby face" looks. But new disrespect on X (formerly Twitter) proved that, in general, the internet won't tolerate mistreatment of Chef Tini.

Tini's cooking is remarkable for several reasons, not least of which is her age. But beyond that, she's known for her comfort and soul food meals.

She doesn't skimp on the flavor and has earned respect from chefs of many backgrounds, as well as discerning foodies the world over. But one X user, perhaps not familiar with Tini's repertoire, made a crack that had the internet seeing red.

X user Lalalisah1431 reposted an image of Tini and her partner, Antoine. The image shows the couple lounging on a boat, with Tini's pale skin making a contrast against Antoine's darker skin. Lalalisah seemed to call attention to the fact that Tini, a caucasian woman, is dating a Black man, by captioning the post, "Poor Black man gonna suffer unseasoned chicken his whole life." And the internet simply wasn't having it.

X user PoeticBlckgrl clapped back with a video montage of Tini making a robustly-flavored Thanksgiving meal, which showed off the Chef's spatchcocking skills and ample seasoning. The clapback was captioned, "We will not tolerate any Tini disrespect."

Users in the comments flooded the post with agreement. One user wrote, "People don’t know we ride for Tini." Others called out the original poster for criticizing Tini's ethnicity, calling her a "great cook" and a "sweet person."

Another user scoffed, "She said Tini’s man is going to eat Unseasoned chicken? Keyboard warriors say anything smh." While more scolded the original poster for bringing race into it, pointing out that Tini's cooking skills exist outside of any connection to her race.

But there's a darker side to the "ride for Tini" support system. One X user pointed out that they have been called "embarrassing" for defending Tini's skills. Several comments scoffed at the defense of Tini's cooking.

The backlash highlights the difficulty of interracial relationships, even in 2024. One user pointed out that internalized racism often shows when interracial couples share their lives in public. And another responded, "It's really stupid where adult humans hating each other over skin color on a floating rock in space, we got bigger problems like our governments but we so hooked on skin color."

Regardless of where people fall on the larger conversation, one thing is clear: No one messes with Tini and her delicious meals. Or the internet will ride at dawn.