I have ARFID. Lots of tastes and textures are the same as torture for me. It sucks.

For the same reason I wouldn’t willingly get stung by most stinging insects. It’s an unpleasant and unnecessary sensation.

Why do some people feel a need to pressure people to do things that make them uncomfortable? Who am I hurting by choosing what I eat?

I’m a somewhat picky eater, not to the extreme that some are but I do limit myself to foods I am sure I will like.

I’m autistic and have sensory issues. I also have a tendency to throw up a lot. I need to choose safe food that I know won’t make me gag and that I’m sure I can physically eat

Not picky. allergies. But it is the real assholes sure love to treat those with allergies like we’re just picky.

either way: what i chose to eat and like is none of all your damned business.

no rawish shellfish, or some fishes. the textures is to gagging.

Reading through all the replies, I’m getting the sense that perhaps your coworker is a bit racist but you did a poor job explaining that in your post. Your post comes across as judgemental of all people who avoid certain foods because you did a bad job of explaining that you meant people who avoid foods because of cultural prejudice. I don’t think you’ll find many people on lemmy who are prejudice against other cultures. I’m not sure what answer you expected. There are some who are just racist, others who may not be racist but just don’t trust food they aren’t familiar with because they’re unsure what’s in it.

I think most people avoid certain foods because they either have a medical condition, ethical concerns, or sensory sensitivity. It sounds like you were looking for an answer from the few who are just racist and I’m not sure what explanation you were expecting for their prejudice.

I cook meals from other cultures a lot but I have to be sure I like all the ingredients first.

Every now and then I’ll eat food that I didn’t like the last time I tried them. I still don’t like pickles, mustard, eggplant, etc. and might never like them. There are other foods I don’t like the texture of, e.g. seafood with rubbery textures. There are other foods I don’t try because they just sound fucking gross, e.g. chicken feet. I understand the arguments for trying chicken feet, but it’s a psychological thing preventing me from trying them. My brain just doesn’t want a fucking chicken foot in my mouth. There are other foods that I’ve tried and might have even enjoyed, but I don’t want to create more demand for that food for one reason or another. I’m fond of ducks. Ducks taste good, but I want ducks to live. I’m increasingly fond of cows, which are delicious, so I rarely eat beef now. I’ve had foie gras and I will never have it again. Geese are assholes but they don’t deserve what humans do to them in order to make foie gras.

If I try to eat something I don’t like, I’ll throw up. It’s a waste of money and food, and gross for anyone around me.

I reject the tone of this question because I wasn’t given a choice in my sensory issues and you turning it into a mortal judgement about me is fucked up.

I don’t eat seafood because I have a weird hypersensitivity to it. Normally I can’t taste anything subtle, but even the slightest bit of seaweed sets off my receptors in an unpleasant way. The smell of seafood alone makes my stomach turn. It’s like the feeling when you realize what you just ate was spoiled.

Why would I force myself to eat something I will not enjoy. I will try a bit but I am not lrdering stuff I don’t like the sound of.

Sometimes the smell which often relates to taste is the first indicator of something tasting not to my liking but if I know I don’t like something (eg mushrooms, I hate those, both taste and texture) I am not willing to try anything involving large quantitiey of said foodstuff

Imo the modern picky eater is a byproduct of food abundance. Acquired tastes were pretty necessary for survival until fairly recently. That said for the life of me I cannot make natto palatable no matter how hard I try

Sounds like you’re lucky enough to not have any sensory problems - you probably don’t get overwhelmed by textures, flavours or smells. Not everyone is like that. You also don’t seem to have any particular cultural or ethical concerns about your food choices. My family is vegan and very neurodivergent; none of us would ever consider steak or shrimp, for ethical reasons, and most of us have texture and flavour sensitivities that mean that certain foods are off limits for some of us. We generally buy within those parameters, but some of us really like things others really hate, so cooking can be a nightmare. In many cases, it’s the texture of food that causes this - often borderline textures going from firm to soft, too granular, “wrong” like soft when should be crunchy etc.

But I bet you have some things you wouldn’t try, based on cultural or texture preferences, which some people love. What about…

• Soft biscuits (cookies) - baked crunchy, but have gone damp and soft?
• Dry, stale bread - baked soft, but just dried out and stale?
• Witchetty grubs - moth larvae from Australia?
• Dog meat, eaten in some Asian countries?
• Fermented shark meat, stinky and rank, eaten in some Nordic states?
• Reindeer poo - traditional Finnish cuisine sometimes uses it?
• Natto - stringy, slimy soya beans fermented by a bacteria, very strong flavour, popular in Asia, especially Japan?
• Tempeh - soya beans colonised by a particular edible mould fungus, eaten widely in Asia?
• Tofu - bean curd in various textures, but very little flavour, eaten widely by vegans and in Asia?
• Furry tofu - tofu colonised by another edible mould fungus, eaten widely in Asia?

hey. get off my ass.