"real food for real people"

[tielan]

So.

The worst thing about this challenge has been seeing how innately racist some of the people doing the challenge are.

The FB group for the last couple of days has been full of posts about going back to 'real food' or 'proper food' or 'things you can actually eat', because rice, lentils, chickpeas, and sardines (also: vegetable oil and flour) are, apparently, not food eaten by real or proper people.

Which...I shouldn't have to explain that here. I feel like I want to do that over there thoug.

Language matters. We know the difference between 'asylum-seekers' and 'refugees' vs 'queue-jumpers' and 'illegals'. Implying that the food we've been eating isn't 'real food' lays a stigma on the people stuck eating these rations day after day after day. After a while of having to eat this, refugees probably don't feel very 'real' either - caught in that no-man's-land between the life they used to have back home and the life that western governments very much don't want to allow them.

I'm trying to find a way to bring this up as politely and clearly as possible. I know there will be many people who'll dismiss this as an issue, because OMG AREN'T YOU TRIGGERED but...there might be a few people who will at least think about what they're casually Othering and the effect that has on both their perspective and the perspective of people around them.

I wonder...several of the people I saw posting about their stuff complained that they weren't getting any fundraising. But...if your underlying attitude isn't innately empathetic to refugees and people who aren't like you, then people probably aren't going to take your sudden desire to 'help' refugees very seriously.

Comments

[james]

I suspect that if you made a post to the group, people doing it would act offended and say things like "well I just mean the food I'm used to" or try to justify it somehow, no matter how polite you are.

If they're already talking/thinking that way, being confronted doesn't tend to make people change their minds. But if you said things like "well I'm used to eating this food, but normally more of it and with additional fresh veg" and so on.

The best way to change someone's mind is to ask them carefully-worded questions, and lead them into changing their own minds. But it's a lot of effort and tends to work best one on one.

[tielan]

This is true. I've posted about this morning and just noted that I'm eating all the same things as the ration challenge, just with all the things that we're fortunate to have, since - like for many people - these staples are the reality of my food just not the whole of it.

[velithya]

I hope your post was received positively!