【Swipe (2017)】

Last Thursday,Swipe (2017) Alex Hall was set to post a new cooking tutorial on The Bottoms Digest, a bottom-friendly recipe TikTok account he runs with his husband Mike Floeck. Instead, he was met with hundreds of messages from concerned followers and friends. Food delivery app Postmates had just released their bottom-friendly menucampaign for Pride Month — and people were quick to notice the similarities. 

"I opened the video and was completely shocked," Hall told Mashable. 

The app partnered with anal surgeon Dr. Evan Goldstein to provide delivery suggestions for dishes for people who plan on receiving anal sex. Postmates announced the campaign, called "Eat With Pride," with a video featuring animated eggplants as tops and peaches as bottoms. The company claimed this to be the first-ever bottom-friendly menu.

"They say that they were the first to create a bottom-friendly menu, when we were actually the first — over a year ago — to do so," said Hall. He and Floeck have been posting recipes on The Bottoms Digest since last June, and are among a group of popular creators of Bottoming TikTok.

Hall stated that in addition to using the same phrase "bottom-friendly," Postmates used similar colors, cadence, and copy as his introduction video to Bottoms Digest, which he published over a year ago. 

Even the slogan in Bottoms Digest's video, "Peachy clean recipes for a peachy clean time," is slightly similar to Postmates's Instagram caption, "You shouldn't miss a good meal for a good time."

"Yet again, a corporation is hijacking content and ideas and original work from a queer person," Hall said, "especially during Pride to profit off of it just for 30 days." He referenced Target seemingly copying a queer creator's designin 2018 and printing it on a T-shirt.

Besides the similarities, Hall took issue with Postmates' broader campaign messaging. The Bottoms Digest, which has over 130,000 TikTok followers, seeks to remind their audience that the recipes aren't about preventing messes in the bedroom — they're about comfort and consent. Postmates' "Eat With Pride" campaign, however, is purely focused on preventing mess when having anal sex. 

Further, the ad centers gay men — both narrator Rob Anderson and Postmates partner Dr. Evan Goldstein are white gay men, specifically — when Bottoms Digest teaches that anyone can bottom. 

"The video was just riddled with cliches and stigmas" of the LGBTQ community, Hall said. The campaign's eggplant tops are adorned with harnesses, for example. Drag queens are portrayed as cupcakes. 

Finally, there's the issue of some actual options Postmates offers for this campaign. Though the company's ad notes foods a bottom should avoid 24 hours before sex (insoluble fiber-loaded things like whole grains, potatoes, cauliflower, and legumes) and encourages choosing foods full of soluble fiber and protein like sushi, both pizza and coffee are on the app's bottom-friendly menu, Hall noticed: 

Pizza and coffee aren't exactly "bottom-friendly" — they're commonly associated with making people gassy or giving them "the shits," as a critic of the menu pointed out on TikTok. Hall himself expressed this concern in a call with Postmates the day after the campaign dropped. The company apparently told Hall the pizza had been vetted and was dairy-free (provided by Prince Street Pizza, a chain in New York and Los Angeles), but Hall replied that tomato sauce, garlic, and onion could be problematic for some people's digestion. The Postmates ad even displays pizza as an example of a food with insoluble fiber to avoid right before bottoming.

"Someone's gonna order this damn pizza that they think is bottom-friendly. They're gonna have a guy come over and they're gonna feel awful," Hall said, "and it's just going to be a shame-ridden experience."

As for coffee (available through Alfred Coffee according to screenshots), Postmates allegedly told Hall that matcha is available, to which Hall replied that oat milk gives some people gas.

In a statement to Mashable, a Postmates spokesperson said, "Our team has been in touch with The Bottom’s Digest. We appreciate their work, and we hear their feedback loud and clear, in regards to our shared goal of addressing a more inclusive sex education."

"As a company focused on delivery to your doorstep, we don’t claim to be chefs or medical professionals," the spokesperson continued. "That’s why we leaned on a health expert to launch the Eat with Pride Bottom-Friendly delivery menu—and we’re happy to keep learning as part of an important, and often omitted, conversation on good meals and good times." The Postmates spokesperson went on to add that the company will continue to support the LGBTQ community after Pride month.

The Bottoms Digest develops recipes and has a test group try them out and offer feedback. The group includes trans people who take hormones and people with IBS. This goes into the account's broader messaging, said Hall: Not only can anyone bottom, but anyone can also benefit from their recipes if they don't.

While many followers called out Postmates, others asked Hall why he didn't trademark the brand. He didn't on purpose — not only would that not stop a corporation from stealing, he said, but it's more so because Bottoms Digest is for everyone. 

"I use my privilege to remind people that my channel is for everyone," he said. "I think it's extremely privileged for me to try to go trademark 'bottom-friendly.'"

Hall and Floeck have been in contact with Postmates in the days since the campaign release, but say it's been an anxiety-ridden experience. "Are we [small queer businesses] just gonna continue to experience this every single June?" Hall asked. He said it's unfair to small queer businesses.

Corporations lifting ideas from small creators in order to cash in on one month a year is just the latest example of capitalist pinkwashing. This Pride, let's focus on the businesses that are queer all year.