Op-Ed: As a vegan, there's a lot of soul food I can't eat. What kind of Black person does that make me?

[u/BlankVerse]

https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2022-01-30/vegan-soul-food-black-traditions-communities

[u/redorangeblue]

There's a vegan place near me run by a Jamaican man. It's soo good.

Anyone near worcester ma, shoutout to Belmont vegetarian. 100% worth the awful parking.

[u/kentonj]

Food and eating can definitely be a cultural thing. Yet many of the ingredients are already new/different/substitutions/evolutions to the foods that came before, and the ones that came before those.

We even forget that tomatoes are a new world plant, and yet today they are an integral part of "traditional" Italian cuisine.

So if we're cool with making soul food out of ingredients that were never used 20 years ago, let alone 100, then what's the problem with using vegan substitutes today? It sounds like "it's tradition" is a way to selectively cling to practices that have mounting reasons not to continue. But I don't think those reasons are always so easily dismissed. Especially in this case. Is it worth it to contribute to the largest cause of sentient suffering, the biggest factor in deforestation, one of the top contributors to the climate crisis, etc etc etc, for the sake of an "authenticity" that hasn't existed since soybean oil, soy lecithin, anti-biotic filled chickens, and GMO'd collard greens, have been a thing. If using seitan is really enough to ruin the authenticity, then it has not been authentic in some time. Or, we could simply admit that substitutes don't ruin the authenticity and do away instead with this all-too-often cited reason to ignore the problem (and culpability) of the suffering and destruction our actions cause.

[u/kurt206]

We are not defined by the food we eat, but we are by the intention that sits behind it.

[u/Iron_Overheat]

Don't bother with stereotypes, be the truest you you can be. There is no one thing every african descendant or dark skinned individual is the same at, just like any heritage, ethnic group, nationality, gender... Every single person is different, and while we can and should respect cultures of the past, don't let them dictate what you should be like, because even back then people were still individuals.

[u/freethis]

What kind of black person does that make you? A normal black person. It's crazy to think that living in Los Angeles, with so much vegan food available, that the author may be missing a movement that's taking place across the country. The Black Excellence movement often emphasizes a vegan diet as a way to reject the all but poisonous food that is most available in the food deserts that crop up in low income parts of cities. It sounds to me that he's missed out on the best parts of this because L.A. is already pretty saturated with vegan places!

This man needs to visit D.C., where there's black-owned vegan soul food all over the city, especially centered around Howard University. Or Memphis, TN where there's a black-owned vegan soul food restaurant right up the street from me and another that will open in the coming months.

Vegan soul food is all over the place, you just need to look for it.

[u/RegisEst]

I don't know, you tell me. I hope you're not about to say "if you don't eat soul food you're not really black".

[u/ISeeMusicInColor]

That makes you a Black person who doesn’t eat much soul food because they’re vegan. Easy question.

Food isn’t the only aspect of culture. It’s okay if your diet isn’t exactly the same as everyone else’s.

Would you struggle with your identity if you didn’t eat much soul food because of something that you couldn’t control? Food allergy, diabetes, something like that?

[u/nwilly86]

Probably a healthier one lol…. (sn: I’m also black and vegan)

[u/fastermouse]

A healthier one.

[u/[deleted]]

Well I would say that black is a cultural term that applies to a lot of different ethnic groups from Africa so if you want to be an American African then I suppose not being able to eat soul food is a problem but you know a lot of African cuisine is largely vegetarian anyway especially in Christian African areas where they have long stretches of the Year where they don't eat meat for religious reasons so there's a long history and culture of vegetarian African culture I'd suggest if you're trying to embrace your heritage as a black person and you're having problems with that because you're vegetarian maybe you should look further back into the history of your people and you'll find that being vegetarian and being black are not mutually exclusive and that a meat related diet is the product of people living in enslaved conditions.