By Robert Scucci
| Published 5 seconds ago
Gotcha games are slowly dismantling society because people no longer think critically, instead chasing sensational “gotcha” moments. I’ll admit, it’s fun to catch someone in the act if they’re actually doing something wrong, but gotcha games aren’t like that. Most of the time, what’s being called out is basic common sense to anyone who understands how things work.
Callouts That Should Be Common Knowledge
After watching a supposed tell-all exposé called “I Tracked Down The Company Ruining Restaurants,” I started thinking about the gotcha game YouTube’s More Perfect Union channel is playing. Their “big reveal” is that chain restaurants use a supplier called Sysco. The mozzarella sticks at one place are the same ones you’ll get at another, because not every restaurant makes them in-house.
To anyone who’s worked in a kitchen, this isn’t news. But to many viewers, it was mind-blowing. The comments are full of people swearing off any restaurant with a Sysco truck out back. Here’s the problem: Sysco doesn’t just sell food. They sell paper goods, utensils, takeout containers, and sanitizer for the dish pit. You name it, they sell it. Thanks to reductive reasoning and yet another gotcha game, people now see their local diners as corporate villains.
I’ve worked in scratch kitchens. We peeled our own potatoes, made our own sauces, hand-breaded and brined our chicken tenders, and formed every burger patty by hand. But even those places used big-box distributors to improve margins and make payroll.
Now, because of this gotcha game, people are ready to boycott small businesses that are simply trying to survive. Sysco supplies schools, prisons, and restaurants alike. They’re a business that sells things to other businesses. And how do people react? By saying “our kids’ school lunches are literally prison food.” See how ridiculous that sounds?
How Do You Think They Did It?
On TikTok, it’s nothing but gotcha games from fast food workers “exposing” their employers for the mustache-twirling villains they truly are. You’ll see Little Caesars employees revealing that the pizza sauce comes from a powdered mix and water. As if anyone expected 4,200 locations that sell eight-dollar pizzas to have chefs crushing fresh tomatoes at dawn.
What’s next? A McRib exposé showing McDonald’s doesn’t fire up a smoker every morning?
Yes, we should be conscious of what we eat, but this reasoning is a slippery slope. I’m not thrilled that mid-tier chains serve the same food at different prices, but boycotting small restaurants because they share national suppliers with major corporations isn’t activism. It’s ignorance.
It’s Not Just Food
I know this sounds like a defense of fast food and corporate giants, but gotcha games are everywhere. This happens to be the one that was on my mind.
As a full-time freelancer and stay-at-home dad, I’m always looking for efficient ways to improve my workflow so I can make a proper living while being there for my kids whenever they need me. I love the quote from Bill Gates: “I choose a lazy person to do a hard job. Because a lazy person will find an easy way to do it.”
That’s great advice, no matter how you look at it. I tell my small-business friends to think about that when hiring contractors. Their response? “Bill Gates is on the Epstein list.”
Okay, but the advice still stands. It’s practical. A hard-working lazy person (the best oxymoron) will always have efficiency in mind. They want to get the job done quickly without cutting corners. That’s a great trait to look for while interviewing applicants. Sure, that particular gotcha game carries some weight, but dismissing every useful idea because of who said it is lazy thinking.
Gotcha games force people into black-and-white thinking. We owe it to ourselves to think critically, because most of life happens in the gray areas where most of us actually live.
