To hate this smashcake craze?

[skerrywind]

A close member of our family has just spent £100 on a smashcake for her 1st baby's birthday.
I find it quite disgusting to waste food like this. It surprises me that I have quite a gutteral reaction to this. I also find it disgusting to see people in baths of beans etc.

Anyone else feel like this or am I just a killjoy?

Imagine having a destroy your brand new £800 computer party.

Yes it's the destructive nature as well as the waste.

Lweji - exactly.

Lets spend £800 on a new sofa and set fire to it for fun.

It makes no sense.
Resources are precious in whatever form.
We use resources to survive and if we are lucky to have fun too.
We drink wine, we make play dough with flour, but to actively rejoice in destruction of resources doesn't sit well with me.
Especially with food, especially when food is such a scare resource for many.

I wouldn't commit myself to debt either Lweji, apart from a mortgage. Not many of us have the means to buy a house outright.

That makes me quite unusual because I'd not enter into car leasing, phone contracts or even contact lens deals. I prefer to pay for things upfront, pay off my credit card in full at the end of the month or go without. Luckily, I can do that, though I don't have limitless funds.

However, I don't think it's wrong to do those things; it's just not something I would consider. But millions of other people are happy with it and manage it well.

I've sometimes saved for things - my first car (not a complete frivolity) and holidays (yes, but I could afford them).

I really don't understand why what other people do bothers people so much if if's not hurting them. And cake smashing is one of those things.

I keep coming back to all those posts on this thread about hairbands and Ellie Maes and thinking whether there's something else lying behind the pious concern for the wanton destruction of the earth's resources and starving people

I'd never even heard of smash cake until I read this thread. And I know loads of people with babies and toddlers. I regularly see 1st Birthday pictures on Facebook but never seen a smash cake. Clearly my friends are all very classy

limitedperiodonly

Sigh.

I wasn't talking about saving vs debt...

Resources are precious in whatever form.

Indeed they are skerrywind.

Lots of people buy flowers to make themselves or others happy. I don't. I think they're a waste of money, and I'm not going to suggest you do.

Flowers are grown in places such as Kenya or Tanzania on land that could be given over to arable food production in such vast quantities that we could end world hunger, or at least put a big dent in it.

But we don't, because people in Britain like flowers. We also like out of season vegetables grown in those countries to satisfy our demand for courgettes in December.

In the scheme of things, someone vulgarly smashing a £10 Asda cake for Ellie-Mae's first birthday pales into insignificance.

Unless you wanted to make a point about the kind of people who do that kind of appallingly vulgar thing. Did you?

Lweji what were you talking about?

I was saying that having to save for it meant that it wasn't exactly spare money that people had to be spending on smashing something and photos of this thing being smashed.

It's not like having loads of money and then deciding to spend a small percentage on a smash a cake party and photos. Or destroying a very expensive cake.

Or any £600 on a single photo shoot, for that matter.

You may find it reasonable for you. I find it shocking.

Unless you wanted to make a point about the kind of people who do that kind of appallingly vulgar thing. Did you?

limited- no, I started this thread to better understand my feelings to be frank.
You make some very valid points- courgettes in December, etc, and no it's not a thread to highlight vulgarity or any "class" judgement.

The family member organising this is a University lecturer, has a PhD, her part of the family are deeply religious, just for perspective.

Whoa harsh!!!

I loved the idea of a cake smash And did it!
*hides

We got a chocolate cake from costco. Took the picks myself. Shared the cake with the rest of the family (she didnt make a mess with the entire cake)

No waste, pics were great and all the mess was confined to the disposable tablecloth we used as a backdrop and threw away.

The OTT handwringing on this thread is genuinely hilarious.

all the mess was confined to the disposable tablecloth we used as a backdrop and threw away.

Lovely.

There are so many narrow minded people on here!

If you don't like it, fine, don't do it!

I'm not a fluffy person, I'm not a "chav", I don't say "lil man" etc!

I'm university educated in a professional role that took 9 years of higher education to achieve. I'm well respected, and I like to think I'm a good person! I donate to charity regularly, and my job involves working with some of the most marginalised people in society.

It's incredibly short sighted, and actually very ignorant, to think less of people just because they like different styles of photography to yourself!

That kind of narrow mindedness is a very ugly trait to have

Disgraceful Donna, you should have taken that disposable tablecloth and turned it into practical playclothes à la The Sound of Music. How can you live with yourself.

t's incredibly short sighted, and actually very ignorant, to think less of people just because they like different styles of photography to yourself!

yes dear. May I ask why bothering with the cake in the first place? Why don't you just give the kid some eggs/ flours/ milk and coco powder to play with? That would make nice pics too?

Lweji I may not always find the things that people do reasonable, but I've mostly given up being shocked by them.

Only one person on this thread said she saved up money to indulge a cake smashing photo op. It's not how I'd choose to spend my money, but it's not my money. It's hers.

I genuinely believe this thread was started by skerrywind to wang on about vulgar people under cover of handwringing about precious global resources.

If we really cared about that, we'd all be vegetarian and talking about our meaningful efforts to reduce global poverty rather than sniping about little girls called Ellie-Mae in hairbands.

Only one person on this thread said she saved up money to indulge a cake smashing photo op.

Yes, and I did find that shocking, tbh. As well as the overall cost of the photos, considering the subject.

In this case, I think me finding it shocking is just as valid as someone else enjoying it and finding it reasonable. They like it and want it. I think it's shocking. Just different opinions.

I suspect the parents who laugh and cheer and clap when their child does a cake smash go ape when the child does it again the following day with whatever food is put in front of them. Small children must get extremely confused.

The family member organising this is a University lecturer, has a PhD, her part of the family are deeply religious, just for perspective.

That's good skerrywind because at least when you turn up, she or he and the wider family will be capable of engaging in meaningful debate.

Let us know how you get on

I'm finding all this pulling of university credentials weird.

And that's from a University (post-grad) lecturer point of view.

In my birth culture playing with food is really tabu.
It stems from times when droughts caused famine and food was a gift not a toy.
I am offended by cake smashes. It is just such a waste and I don't think it's a healthy or ethically right.
It also makes me cringe when people adopt US trends of consumerism.

It's just another opportunity for more pointless, tedious photos with which to bore everyone on social media.

I agree with those upthread who said that a baby accidentally falling asleep in a cake is funny, because it's unexpected, but a staged photo shoot is just weird. The ones I've seen all involve weird outfits as well - tutus for girls and Chippendale style bow ties with no shirt for boys. It's all just odd and pointless.

I've just googled and OMG- just why ? Wrong on so many levels; the sugar for a 1 year old ! The food colouring ! What the hell are you trying to teach them about food and meal times ?. For refference I was terribly proud that by 10 or 11 months mine would sit in a high chair and feed themselves ( using a spoon as well) with relatively little mess, I cannot comprehend why you would undo all that work.- Horrible

I'm finding all this pulling of university credentials weird.

So do I Lweji I wonder why skerrywind brought it up. That's from a person with nothing more with A levels point of view. I'm not religious either, but don't see what that's got to do with it either