Month: July 2017

Dear Vegan White Woman,

I shared my opinion (via an article) on how it’s disrespectful for people to casually appropriate other cultures. For example, by wearing ritual headdresses, bindis, dreads and cornrows. You responded by asking me if I was the police now for whether or not you could date a person of color or still shop at your favorite sari shop. (You said a few other things, but those are the only two things I remember.) I did not respond to your comment. In fact, no one in the thread responded, because clearly no one was policing anyone. It was a discussion.

Because of this I believed that you think because you have access and the ability to purchase things that are from another culture, that it’s yours to take, use and wear. What I have now learned from this, is that it’s complicated. It’s true that you have access to select and purchase these items, but that doesn’t mean that it’s respectful to wear or use them.

I now realize that it’s confusing for people to have access to things and not understand why they can’t enjoy them. Perhaps someone might think, “but they sold it to me”. Well, it may have been a corporation’s choice to massively appropriate a culture. Like fashion magazines that call cornrows, “a new fashion braid” for the Summer. It may have been a mom and pop Indian shop that sold you your bindis, because they assumed you were using them correctly. You may have bought your faux ritual headdress online. However it was that you gained the privilege to attain these items, even as a gift, access does not equate respect.

It’s disrespectful for white people to wear cornrows, braids and similar hairstyles because it sends a message of entitlement and disregard to those who can’t. Yes, in 2017.  Here is an article documenting on how it’s happening right now in our own backyard: Black students at Massachusetts charter school served detention, suspended from sports teams for wearing hair in braids. So white people might think they look cute in cornrows and dreads, but they might as well wear a tattoo across their forehead that says “Fuck all you Black folx that get punished for wearing your hair like this. I can, so I will.”

This experience has enabled me to examine my own experience of appropriation. I have worn a bindi and sari before in my life. (What?!) Yes, but it wasn’t as a costume. I’m not saying that when you wear saris it is as a costume, but I am just sharing how I came about to wear several saris and Punjabi suits.

One of my best friends in high school was Gujrati. She and I meditated a lot together and so I spent a lot of time eating after school snacks with her, in her mother’s kitchen. Around that time, I started to study Hinduism seriously and so she and her family would invite me to ritual chanting events at her temple and bangla dances. So they would dress me up in saris and Punjabi suits, a million matching bangles and pick out bindis for me. It was on their terms, specifically for the purpose of attending their culture’s ritual events. I have never worn a sari or Punjabi suit, outside of this context. I didn’t end up converting to Hinduism.

That said, I may own some things that are ritual objects or appropriative clothes that I don’t know about. I don’t think I do. I could be wrong. I have forgiven you for your comments on my discussion thread. After all, you deleted them. I’m so glad I didn’t have to. I forgive myself for not reaching out to you about it. Instead I just boiled inside making assumptions about you. Maybe you’re Hindu and you also only wear your saris to temple? Maybe you’ve struggled with dating people of other cultures and you felt like I was saying you can’t? I don’t know you outside of a few animal rights campaigns. I acknowledge myself for being curious about your defensiveness. I really don’t want to be mad at you. I am grateful for your deleting your comment. I commit to keeping the discussion open. I hope we’ll have it one day.

May we heal the illusion of separation.

Blissful wishes,
Bee

Dear Vegan Straight Woman,

Sometime last year, I hosted a retreat that overtly specified that people of the LGBTQ community were welcome. You wrote me a letter saying, “No thanks, I’m straight.” And I wrote back to you saying that “straight women were also welcome.”

Also during our exchange, I expressed that we had always created retreats that welcomed everyone. However, straight people always seemed to feel comfortable going to most events without discrimination, so I wanted to be overt about our inviting the LGBTQ community. (I regret not saying LGBTQIA, but that’s in the future.) I said we wanted everyone to feel comfortable attending and that only straight men were not invited to this event. You said, “That’s no fun.”

We exchanged a few more emails and you finally said:

“I wouldn’t be comfortable in such a closed environment where the lifestyle is “right in my face.” In most public areas it is easier to ignore.
But it’s your retreat place and you certainly have the right to invite anyone you want. I simply choose not to go. Thank you.”

What is this lifestyle that you speak of? Is there a way that we act that is offensive? What did you think was going to happen? Did you think we were all going force you to cut your hair short, try to convert you, start making out and pull out heroine needles? (My cranky words, not yours.) It’s this attitude, where we are lumped into a stereotype of your making. Perhaps a hedonist evil and/or a proselytizing cult. Trust me, there are plenty of reasons I don’t talk about being queer. One reason is my second partner committed suicide. Another reason, is because of people like you, who say harmful things.

Because of this, I believed that you hate LGBTQ people and our cultures.
FYI – There isn’t one culture. We’re as varied culturally as we are straight people. What I have now learned from this type of aversion, is sometimes people are just afraid of what they don’t know or understand.

I now realize that it can be a really confrontational experience to be around people that have different preferences than you. I find that when a person doesn’t want something “in their face”, it’s because they maybe they don’t want to ask themselves hard questions like, “Could I be queer?” “Would I like it?” “Who would reject me or stay my friend?” “Will people think I’m queer, because I attend an LGBTQIA-friendly event?” I feel like, if you took the time to ask yourself and were ok with the answers, you wouldn’t be bothered to be around us.  I would say it’s like being vegan, but being vegan is a choice; being queer is not. I can’t erase it from how I experience myself. I’ve tried. I now realize that it’s important to say that I am queer. This experience with you validated my reason even more for overtly inviting our LGBTQ family and community to this retreat.

I have forgiven you for saying those things. I don’t have time to hold your objections of us in my heart. I have forgiven myself for not telling you that your assessment of our lifestyle, included me.  I acknowledge myself for being afraid of being bullied or discriminated against by people that say and harm LBGTQIA family.  I am grateful for your reaching out to me, because now I know how important it is to continue to create invitations that don’t fit the hetero-normative status quo. I commit to overtly inviting our LGBTQIA family to all future events. I hope one day you’ll join us in this understanding.

May we heal the illusion of separation.

Blissful wishes,
Bee

Dear Vegan White Woman,

Several years ago we were engaging in an animal rights action of bearing witness, and you started to talk with someone next to you about a woman’s body.

I didn’t see the photograph, but I didn’t need to. You said something to the effect of, “Clearly she could lose weight.” After that moment, I internally banned you from my cool list. Fat shaming, not cool. Vegans fat shaming, the worst.

Some people, even vegan doctors, like to say that vegans shouldn’t be fat. For who? For the vegan movement? For the animals? Nope. I think people should be themselves (.) I am not a health vegan, I am an ethical vegan. I think it’s a great side effect, that animals are spared murder, because people choose to become vegan for health reasons. However, this does not grant anyone permission to go around telling other people how they should live in their bodies.

Because you said this, I believed that it wasn’t safe for me or my fat and curvy friends to be around people that say body shaming things like you did. What I have now learned from this, is that I don’t care what fat shaming people think anymore. I now realize that I’m not more or less of an important person, because I don’t fit into some people’s definition of a “healthy vegan body.”

This experience enabled me to seek out other vegans who understand what it means to be respectful around or in the absence of those who struggle with sizeist, fat shaming and all the disrespect that goes along with objectification of our bodies.

Since this comment, I noticed you called yourself out on this perspective.
So I am happy to say, I have sincerely forgiven you for what you said. I have begun to forgive myself for not giving you the benefit of the doubt. I could stand to lose some of my pride around you. I suppose I could have “called you out” on it back then, but we weren’t there for that. We were there for the other animals that were being objectified for the consumption of their bodies.

I acknowledge your efforts for becoming aware of the way you fat shamed others and even yourself.  I am grateful for your saying that fat shaming phrase, because it pushed me to create a retreat for curvy vegans.

I commit to continuing the create celebratory spaces for curvy vegans and I am glad that you have begun to too. Thank you.

May we all continue to heal the illusion of separation.

Blissful wishes,
Bee