Holier than thou
Since I avoid eggs, milk, and meat, some people have erroneously concluded that I'm vegan. Actually, I'm allergic to eggs, sensitive to dairy, and I don't like most types of meat. Plus, I can't eat corn or potatoes, which doesn't fit under the "vegan" label at all.
Of course, there's no fun in giving up foods without drawing some sense of moral superiority from it, so I set about to figure out some sort of politically correct reason not to eat corn or potatoes.
Potatoes and corn are both new world foods, so I decided that the next time someone offered me, say, tater tots, I would give them an icy stare and say "In protest of the historical treatment of the indigenous population of the Americas, I don't eat new world foods." (Just to be clear, for those who don't know me well, I would never actually do this. I just think it's a funny idea. The crazy thing is if you said this kind of thing in somewhere like Chaimpaign-Urbana, they'd take you completely seriously.)
Of course, I'll also have to avoid tomatoes, in order to properly complete the new world trifecta, but it seems like a small price to pay. (Plus, in light of the recent salmonella outbreak, I'm temporarily off tomatoes, anyway.)
What I really need, though, is a name for this new type of dietary restriction. Any suggestions?
15 Comments:
well, you could call it "colonialism", though really it's anti-colonialism, but that's too long. or indigenism, but, once again, that's the opposite. irrindigenism?
sanctity? righteousness? edward said?
"According to the FDA, 'types of tomatoes not linked to any illnesses are cherry tomatoes, grape tomatoes, and tomatoes with the vine still attached.'"
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Tomatoes on the vine are almost always much tastier anyway.
Three options:
"Sorry, I don't eat Incan."
"I'm an east-of-30er."
Or, you could just call yourself a terra antiguan. Or just antiguan.
Oooh, "antiguan" is *awesome*.
Would you have to give up cane sugar?
Ooh, I think alea wins. I can totally see someone saying "I'm a terra antiguan" with a withering glare.
jb - I don't know. I hope not, because between corn syrup and sugar, that would eliminate almost all sweeteners.
"Around the eighth century A.D., Arabs introduced sugar to the Mediterranean, Mesopotamia, Egypt, North Africa, and Spain. By the tenth century, sources state, there was no village in Mesopotamia that didn't grow sugar cane.[2] It was among the early crops brought to the Americas by Spaniards."
(Cite)
Awesomely, though, you can also buy beet sugar from heath food suppliers.
You'll have to give up squash too.
Peppers probably wouldn't be too hard, but you mustn't forget that chocolate (well, cocoa) also originated in the Americas. Ready to give that up too? :)
mr. fob & lj -- Hmm. Now that may be asking too much. (On both counts, surprisingly.) I wonder if corn and potatoes have anything else in common . . .
They both share features named after body parts? (Ear of corn, eyes of potatoes.) They're both part of state nicknames/slogans? ("Famous Potatoes," "Cornhusker State.") This would also rule out dairy (but you've already done that [Wisconsin is "America's Dairyland"]), peaches (Georgia), and sunflowers (Kansas). Not to mention beaver and pelican. (I'm debating if New Jersey as the "Garden State" would rule out garden produce.)
And "The Beehive State" would mean no honey. :(
I don't know what to call it, but if you figure it out, I want to make up flyers and hand them out to people on the street.
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The problem I have with your argument is that maybe you should eat the indigenous foods and avoid the colonializers like lemons and parsley. So maybe you should be pro-colonialism---but that probably wouldn't go over as well.
No cane sugar, but what about guava? And for the record, I like terra antiguan, too.
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