Kids' Lunches Brought from Home: 1990's vs. Today

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Not a parent myself, but I got a question that parents on here could easily answer. It's about having your kids bring their lunches from home (made by parent), and their classmates' reactions to different foods. Consider my life story. Please note that the description applies only to the United States and border regions of Canada.

1990's
I went to school for most of the 1990's. Back then, I clearly remember that you were "supposed to" bring only the most mainstream, stereotypical foods. Any deviation from middle America was "penalized". That means resulted in bullying if the lunch owner was low social status and silent looks if he was high social status. Homemade lunches followed this highly rigid ranking system:
* The highest rank was held by Lunchables, chips, soda, crackers from a box, anything made by the likes of Little Debbie and Betty Crocker, and prepackaged string cheese. All but the "uncoolest" kids automatically gained the cool status for the lunch period when seen eating these foods.
* The second rank was held by American sandwiches, and only American ones: peanut butter and jelly, bologna, ham and cheese, chicken salad, tuna salad, egg salad. The last two moved down a rank in middle school, when having fresh breath became important. "Uncool" kids eating these lunches were generally treated slightly better than normally.
* The third rank was held by portable leftovers of typical American foods (must be American to fit this rank), the kind that required tupperware and a plastic fork. Examples include cut-up rotisserie chicken, a homemade burger eaten cold, potato salad, pasta salad, etc. For the post part, only the cool kids could get away with eating them. Others were called a "dork who can't eat normal stuff".
* The lowest rank was held by everything not fitting into the above categories, except untouchables. Ethnic foods are the most notable example: moussaka, bahn mi, sushi, chicken tikka masala, pierogi, etc. Bringing these to school was absolutely "prohibited". "Violators" risked being teased mercilessly for days. Even the coolest kids had people's respect for them drop down a notch.
* The untouchable rank was held by any food resembling, umm..., body fluids. Examples include chili, lumpy sausage links, cream of chicken soup, etc (interestingly, Mountain Dew was exempt). If a kid ate these in school, other kids wouldn't sit near him. Toward middle school, these moved up to lowest or even third rank, due to the Fear Factor-like aspect of eating them.

School lunches were easier. They were separated into just three categories: good, OK, and bad.
* Good foods included things like pizza, hot dogs, hamburgers, tacos, burritos, grilled cheese sandwiches, and chicken nuggets.
* OK foods included things like fish sticks (off taste at times), corn (nasty unless salted), and french fries (not crispy but still "cool")
* Bad foods included things like ravioli (just plain nasty), chili (flavorless), anything with sauce (too greasy), and vegetables ("uncool")
Unlike for homemade lunches, ranking was quite flexible. The unwritten rule said that you were supposed to eat only "good" foods and "OK" foods if you wished to. However, if someone was seen eating "bad" foods, he could easily say something like "I have to, I'm starving", and more often than not, be left alone. For some reason, buying and bringing your lunch did not make a difference; neither was cooler than the other. What changed was the scale on which your lunch was "evaluated". By high school upper classes, lunch ranking systems of any kind pretty much disappeared; everything except strong-smelling foods was acceptable.

Today
Honestly, I'm not sure. I graduated high school in 2001, and the same attitude remained. No one gives a damn what a classmate or a coworker brings, unless a particular food items has a strong smell. At the same time, tremendous changes took place in the American food culture, like the following.
* Sushi went from "ew!" to "wow!".
* Taco Bell used to be at least somewhat cool; now it's practically a laughingstock.
* Ethnic foods now arouse curiosity instead of revulsion, in all but the youngest age groups.
* Healthy eating has gone very much mainstream.
* Subway became more widespread than McDonald's exactly because it's seen as healthier.

My questions for the parents are these:
* Is still socially unacceptable to bring ethnic foods to eat at school for lunch?
* Do kids now accept healthy eating as normal, rather than something pushed on them by adults?
* Do homemade lunches follow a ranking system of any kind? (through unwritten rules, obviously)
* Is it now cooler to bring your lunch from home or to buy your lunch at school?
* What's the "penalty" for bringing the "wrong" food to school for lunch?

I don't know about the first question. Up until this year, my kids were almost the only "white" kids in their school and they are actually mix-raced. Many (the majority?) of the other kids came from immigrant families, so I doubt many of them were bringing in American food from home.

I think your second question is at least partially correct. One time at The Cheesecake Factory my daughter (who is 6 and who I am teaching to order for herself) said "I'll have the baked chicken please." To which I responded "That is not nuggets, and it comes with broccoli instead of fries" to which she responded "I would like to have a healthy meal." My son also took to eating salads because he saw other kids at school eating them.

I cannot answer 3 because both of my kids eat the school food. I do not know if it is "cooler" or not and they don't have a choice LOL!

I don't remember things being that bad when I was a kid...I always brought sandwiches and never really paid attention to what anyone else was eating. I did get teased for bringing a Go-Bots lunchbox to school when I started Jr High, though.

Anyway to answer your question, I don't really know. My kid is in pre-K and barely verbal, so I doubt he'd care or even realize if anyone was teasing him about what he's eating. We often pack ethnic food (curry, sushi, etc) for him because that's what he likes.

When I went to school, the sandwiches were rated in desirability, too. Peanut butter and jelly was low, deli meat (even bologna) was higher. If you had a parent who made you weird sandwiches, like I did, it was even worse than peanut butter and jelly.

Mainly kids were rated on their sides. If you had fruit, back then, it was low and pitiful. The cool things was chips and that sort of thing. If you brought something cool, you could participate in trades. If you brought something low, you might occasionally get a pity "share" offer from someone you were good friends with.

I have no idea what is popular now, as my son has a ton of food aversions, including to "cool foods." (At least according to coolness ratings from the past.) I send him what he will eat. He would have no clue about the lunch status thing, and he would not care if he did,

My daughter goes to a school where they don't allow junk foods. It seems like the "cool kids" bring homemade healthy foods from home in reusable containers. The "uncool" kids bring lunchables and prepackaged snack foods (with shameful throwaway packaging). She goes to a bit of alternative school that seems more "granola" than most. In this school the cool kids are the ones who make good grades-the uncool kids don't study and make worse grades.

When I was in school in the 70's and 80's the cool kids always had hot lunch and the uncool kids had the brown bag lunches.