I don't eat swine, but yeah I got a big behind
You don't eat any meat; you look at me with deceit
With your chicken from Tyrone's you don't feel alone
It doesn't make any sense that you look at me like I don't exist
Sis, I don't like slave food, dude I don't eat the white man's scraps
I love my godly naps, my body is a temple,
shouldn't what I place in it,
be a symbol of some serious thought
instead of whatever that is man-made or brought
I sought, to be queen-like original, but like Chris Rock says niggas love to not know
You say, “Shit I eat anything.” It doesn't matter
the dirtiest, the fattest, as long as you can put hot sauce or ketchup on it,
it's the bomb diggity
Forgive me for coming so hard on you meat-eaters
but as a group, you laugh at me and question me like I eat rat or
any other meat, whitey, Asian, or anybody else throw at my feet.
All I'm saying is don't give me a hard time for not eating meat
Cause I got a million intelligent reasons why than your shit
Like “its good, u wish you could”
Damn stop being a nutritional Uncle Tom cause being a vegan is not wrong
(circa 1997)
I was a little angry back when I wrote that. You know I was your usual “fight the power” sistah in the midst of Black faces with white paint at the local university. No one understood me. I encountered a lot of debates on my choice to be a vegetarian with many of my peers. It wasn't as popular for a Black person to eat healthy back in 1997 as it is now. Vegetarianism's popularity has come a long way. It's getting much easier to eat and live among the masses of meat-eaters. Vegetarian spots and vegetarian-friendly additions to menus are popping up everywhere. Through the muffled cries of sick people, the government saw the opportunity for the economy to prosper off the need to live a healthier life. Hence you have the new vegetarian era. My options are still limited, but at least I've got two vegetarian markets and a number of vegetarian- or vegan-friendly restaurants to go to. So that's good for Baltimore, being that this is the home of the best crabs and seafood in the world. But even though more people are interested and accommodating when it comes to me being a vegan, there are still a lot of misconceptions.
People assume that just because you are a vegan, your front is animal rights, and they think they should never see you in a leather coat or shoes. But that's not what motivates me to not eat meat. I'm not a walking PETA advertisement. I don't even understand animal rights. As much energy as these organizations put into animal rights, if they put the same into human rights, these animals wouldn't be mistreated in the first place. It's just an ongoing cycle of lack of compassion for each other that has developed in the relationship with the world. Animal cruelty is just the byproduct of human cruelty and is not the equivalent. One just perpetrates the other.
The recent death of the crocodile man, Steve Irvin, showed an example of someone who showed so much passion for animals that it was reflected on everybody he came in contact with or who watched his show. Now, that's making a difference. I agree that they should pass laws regulating and limiting the unethical treatment of animals and the unnecessary use of them in everyday products and foods. But it's the consumption of animals that's getting out of control, that's hurting people and animals, not the wearing of them. Most people can't afford real leather or fur; there are so many leather and fur imitations, who knows who is really wearing it? PETA seems to know.
I don't choose to wear leather or fur, but if I happen to wear it, it doesn't contradict me as a vegan. A vegan is one who doesn't eat any meat or dairy or products and that's what I do. Of course, I don't support the purchase of, nor do I use, animal products. But I won't sacrifice a nice leather coat at the thrift store on sale or rip a fur off a person's back in broad daylight because I'm a vegan. I would like to see a PETA supporter scream at a brother in the 'hood wearing a fur. Being a Black woman, you have to be conscious of the things you support, because self-preservation is most important. If organizations don't support the growth and development of my people, then what am I really fighting for? They have distanced themselves as the elite, middle class. I think PETA does a good job with producing those slaughterhouse movies and getting the word out, but they don't connect with the average minority. Being a vegan is a usual characteristic of PETA supporters, but not all vegans are PETA members or are white.
I don't think humans in general should eat meat, but I definitely don't think Black people should eat meat. With the problems of blood pressure, diabetes, obesity, and, yes, just plain racism, current-day Soul Food could be one of the culprits for the race's downfall. The rate of blood pressure among African-Americans in the United States is the highest in the world. Over eighty percent of all Black people are lactose intolerant and most don't even know it. We have accepted another race's diet for our own. Our bodies are not reacting well to the diet of the masses. America's diet is an example of sweeping racial differences under the door. We all have differences, and we have to acknowledge that those differences play a part in everything we do, including our diet. Recently, the food pyramid had to be changed because it doesn't work for all races. That, in itself, was a lesson to let others know that we all have different cultural dietary needs and that they need to be addressed. Diet is the racial oppression that Black people have to get over in order to survive.
Even though as a child I constantly suffered from headaches after eating pork chops, I ate meat all the time. In the eighth grade, a Muslim classmate did a report on the harmful effects of swine. I looked into the subject and found a lot of information about pork and the connection with the headaches I would get. Right away, I stopped eating it. Gradually, year after year, I would learn more and more about different meats and would stop eating them. I was a long-term vegetarian. It started out as youthful disgust and became a lifelong and growing commitment not to eat meat. I wasn't a good vegetarian, with the various years in between, but every New Year I would go “cold turkey” with a new meat. I wasn't as focused a label reader as now and that probably resulted in me eating a lot more meat in my food than I knew.
It was Sister Souljah's autobiography, No Disrespect, that got me serious about being a vegetarian. When I read it, I was in search of my racial identity similar to her journey in the book, where she writes that her dietary habits improved during her growth. I, too, wanted to align my mental growth with my diet, because they are one. I understood what it meant to be holistic, and how your mind, body, and spirit have to be aligned in order to have optimal health.
An unexpected journey actually drove me to being a vegan; it turned out to be just an elevation from being a vegetarian. While I stocked my pantry with the essential things I needed to be a better vegetarian and was doing my scheduled fasts, I felt it was important for me to be in the most natural state, which symbolized going back to my original state of existence before the enslavement of my racial identity. I happened to come upon the books African Holistic Health and Nutricide by Dr. Llaila Afrika. Those books gave me yet another freedom, one I'd not yet encountered, which was the nutritional liberation from mainstream America. The theory of not accepting another race's diet for my own was revolutionary and profound to me. The idea of freeing myself nutritionally from the oppressors' diet motivates me to avoid meat. I soon became a vegan to solidify my nutritional commitment.
That same commitment is extended to my dating life. I do compromise with vegetarians and soft-core meat-eaters, those who don't eat meat that much, and are very open to being a vegetarian. All my meat-eating friends say I'll never meet a Black man who's a vegetarian, and definitely won't meet one who's vegan. I think it really depends on where you live; the more culture a city has, the more opportunity there is for people to be exposed to vegetarianism. I've been out with hard-core meat eaters (those who don't ever want to become a vegetarian or may even not like vegetables), and it simply doesn't work. Food is centered around everything: ceremonies, celebration, cookouts, and meetings of every sort. It ends up being the insensitive joke and issue in the relationship. Diet affects the way a man smells and definitely tastes; being physical with your mate is inevitable. Some things just can't be compromised.
Currently, I am single; so I might not be average. My nine-to-five life as a vegan is filled with work lunches, a happy hour or two, and an occasional nightclub or date. I'm very creative with my food choices. I look into popular restaurants' drinks and acknowledge what is vegan-friendly. These social interaction outings are important to a healthy state of mind. Who wants to turn into the old vegan cat lady?
One day, if I do reproduce, I want to have a vegetarian household, so having a mate who shares the same feelings is ideal for me. Being a vegan is more than a choice; it's a lifestyle. My ideal mate would have to embrace the lifestyle that comes along with being more conscious about food choices and everything he does. I don't think it's a lot to ask a man to divorce a diet of slave food and embrace a more kinglike diet with healthy foods. I can respect a man who knows how to eat to live and loves hip-hop; he might be the man for me.
A psychic told me one time that if I wasn't a vegetarian, I'd be dead. My grandfather had diabetes, my grandmother had diabetes, and my father has diabetes. Now, whether the psychic just made an obvious acknowledgment of the growing number of Black people dying from diet-related diseases, or was really tuned in, either way, I still took it as a valuable piece of information. I'm one month away from becoming thirty years old, and one of the things I'm satisfied about in life is my decision to be a vegan. It feels good to eat good foods. My decision to go the road least traveled with my diet reflects my evolving journey of cultural refinement and my lifelong commitment to being in my most original state.
I am what I eat, what I think, and how I feel.
I am busy living in the right now and trying to do my best every day.
That to me is success. —YOKO ONO
That's where I am right now.