How do you respond to online trolls spewing hateful comments online?
Make them eat their words. Literally.
- Scroll down or click here to vote in our poll of the day
That’s how one Brooklyn-based baker is hitting back at cyber trolls who post hurtful words online.
Kat Thek, the founder of Troll Cakes, bakes cakes in her kitchen with the cruel comment printed on top in colourful writing and mails it to the online harasser of a customer’s choosing.
She came up with the idea after she stumbled across a particularly mean post on Dolly Parton’s Facebook page not too long ago. Thek told CTVNews.ca in a phone interview from Brooklyn, N.Y. on Monday that the commenter wrote “Your mama be (sic) so disappointed” on the country music star’s profile.
The creative dessert-maker said she couldn’t believe anyone would have “beef” with the popular musician.
“It was so obviously incorrect. Dolly Parton is a 71-year-old millionaire with a theme park. I’m positive her mother would be super proud of her,” Thek said with a laugh.
Thek said the insult was so absurd that she just had to put it on a cake. Once she did, she had a realization – why not mail the completed dessert to the Parton troll so they can see how ridiculous their comment really is? And thus, Troll Cakes was born.
“It’s just funny to see things that you wouldn’t ordinarily expect show up on a cake and then I realized it’s very funny to see a mean thing on a cake,” Thek said.
Since launching the business a little more than three weeks ago. Thek, who also works as a copywriter, has come up with three options for customers looking to send cakes to online haters.
Buying a Troll Cake
• The first option costs US$35 and involves the buyer sending Thek a screengrab of the online comment they wish to have printed on the cake and the address of the recipient.
• With the second option, for $60, a customer can send Thek the mean comment and she’ll track down a work or home address for the online troll and send the cake there.
• The third, and perhaps the most hilarious option, is the “Tiny Hands Special” where customers can send Thek a Tweet or quote from U.S. President Donald Trump and she’ll print it on a cake and mail it to the White House for $30.
“We have a troll in the White House,” she explained. “Whatever your politics are, you can’t ignore that Trump says bizarre insults on Twitter.”
Thek said she realized Trump appreciates cake after he once described a chocolate cake he ate as the “most beautiful” during a televised interview in April.
The first option, where customers already have an address for her, is the most popular one.
“It’s usually somebody making fun of a friend or a family member who had a tantrum online, which I think is the funniest thing,” she said.
Thek said she’s had a few dozen orders so far and plenty of interest. She said she’s been receiving messages asking her what she’s willing to print on a cake.
“If somebody said it, we’ll put it on a cake,” she said. “The only time we won’t is if it’s something that’s violent or it’s clearly from a deranged troll.”
When asked if she’s received any replies from the online trolls she’s mailed cakes to, Thek said she hasn’t yet but that she’s hoping she will soon.
“I check my P.O. box every day and I’m so excited looking for a response cake or something like that,” she said.
The bubbly baker said she plans to keep creating her Troll Cakes and mailing them for as long as she can.
‘“I love it. It’s fun,” Thek said. “It has a way of kind of putting everything into perspective.”
