It’s important that we make the connections between the health of ourselves and the planet with imperialistic, driven by capitalism, worldwide oppression. Adopting a whole foods plant based diet (vegan, vegetarian part or full time) is one of the most effective ways to influence change as an individual. Supporting the factory farm industry drives deforestation, proliferates aquatic dead zones and pumps methane (which has a higher global warming potential *GWP* than CO2) into the atmosphere via animal farts and feces. The factory farm industry is the most deleterious to the planets health; more so than all of transportation combined. CAFO (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operation) workers are subjected to hazardous working conditions, low wages and toxic gases that impede on both their health and the health of neighboring communities. This should come as no surprise as a characteristic of our current economic system is the pursuit of profit, which often demands the exploitation of workers. As we continue the struggle in 2015, we have to be mindful to include an internationalist, environmental analysis in our ideology. For Malcolm X said that once we see how they play the game over there, we’ll know how they play it here and I say that all of this is moot if there’s no planet to live on. Check out a blog post by Tracye McQuirter, friend and author of By Any Greens Necessary. From the blog: “Indeed, sustained activism requires that we not only take the time to eat well, but to exercise and meditate, too, so that we can be the most helpful to ourselves and others. Even during the Civil Rights Movement, naturopath Alvenia Fulton and others led participants in fasts and healthful eating. And it’s important to note that just as there were 313 extrajudicial killings of black people in 2012, there were more than 300,000 preventable deaths of black people in 2010 caused by diet-related chronic diseases, including heart disease, stroke, and hypertensive disease. This is not a comparison game. Rather, it’s a reminder that unhealthful diets are a social justice and human rights issue, too, since there are state-sanctioned reasons that low-income African Americans, in particular, do not have access to healthful foods.“
Posted on: Sat, 03 Jan 2015 16:55:15 +0000
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