Thread by @_CarolJAdams

Dear @VegNews: I am shocked that you carried the statement by the authors of #ThugKitchen announcing their name change in your 2020 holiday issue without providing any context about their racist practices and cultural appropriation over the past 8 years. 1/x

#TheBeardedVegans offered a definitive two-part series on Thug Kitchen exposing this. They explain, "Matt and Michelle, the couple behind #ThugKitchen made a habit of slyly dodging their critics & employing a litany of gaslighting techniques to explain away their behavior." 2/x

You can find the first part of #TheBeardedVegans podcast here: thecommentist.com/bearded-vegans… 3/x

In the 2nd part of #TheBeardedVegans podcast they do a piece by piece break down of the last podcast under the #ThugKitchen moniker, which seemed to reveal their true feelings about their critics. thecommentist.com/bearded-vegans… 4/x

For 8 years, the 2 white people behind #ThugKitchen benefited from white supremacy, variously refusing to engage with their critics, disparaging their critics, ignoring their critics, posturing as the victims. 5/x

all the while using their position as whites within a white supremacist world for profit. (We know, they told us, bragging about the success of their books.) 6/x

They tried to deracinate the idea of the word "thug" in their defense while at the same time benefiting from the contemporary meaning of the word thug, a stereotype that literally gets black men killed. Read @ThotsandPrayers all-creatures.org/articles/ar-th… 7/x

#ThugKitchen knew the problem with the word "thug" when they began, because #TrayvonMartin was killed in February 2012, many months before their first blog appeared. See @sistahvegan here: sistahvegan.com/2014/10/09/on-… 8/x

If the decision by 2 white people to stop using the word “thug” in their branding is news to you @vegnews where were you when respected Black vegan chef @bryantterry critiqued them SIX YEARS AGO? cnn.com/2014/10/10/liv… 9/x

#ThugKitchen kept using that name despite the existence of the #blacklivesmatter movement in 2013, a year before the publication of their 1st cookbook. vice.com/en_us/article/… 10/x

They took a dangerous stereotype that has gotten Black men killed, and played with it. They then said it wasn’t a dangerous stereotype, etc. #TheBeardedVegan call their behavior gaslighting and after listening to their two-part podcast, you will probably agree. 11/x

Shame on you @vegnews by participating in their “whitewashing” of their racism, and letting them off so easy.
madamenoire.com/473708/bothers… 12/x

.@vegnews should have told your readers that it took 6 years of being told to abandon #ThugKitchen for them to do so. 6 years of implying their critics were jealous of their success. This is shameful. 13/x

For those 6 yrs, they helped regressive white vegans to continue believing that you can separate #veganism from the social, historical & political context of #whitesupremacy. But, you can't. Check out #TheBeardedVegans for links to many more articles thecommentist.com/bearded-vegans… 14/14

I want to note that @VegNews does state after printing the statement in a purple font, that Davis and Holloway announced their decision "to change their brand name after 8 yrs of what critics saw was cultural appropriation." But this kind of equivocation (critics) is the problem

As one person in response to this thread notes, @VegNews covered this issue better online. But my concern is that the print coverage fails to hold them accountable, deferring to undefined "critics" & leaving it to the reader to figure out what was actually going on.

It is not that their critics said they were being culturally appropriative; it is that they WERE being culturally appropriative. Reporting it the first way gives room for a debate about whether the critics were right. If they weren't right Holloway & Davis would not have changed

Here's the problem with deferring the critique to others, and letting it be a they said/they said report: this is exactly what Holloway & Davis did to deflect criticism.