I had an interesting conversation this evening with a gentleman I was connected with by a dear friend. The discussion was about sizable speaking gigs. The conversation was a form of interview but quite cordial and relaxed. Towards the end of the conversation, the gentleman asked me how I dress. I calmly answered that I typically wear African shirts or a whole African attire. The next question was whether I own a suit. Being blatantly honest, I replied that I gave all my suits away years back and I got out of the suit and tie business from that point to today. My contact asked me if I would wear a suit if he would buy me one. My answer was in the affirmative but with a slight caveat. I didn’t mind wearing a suit if any superior logic could convince me that my logic to give away my suits was faulty. I then clarified that it’s not my inability to buy a suit that results in my wearing African clothes. It is out of a conscious, well thought out decision. There was a brief pause. Can I ask you why you decided against wearing a suit?, he asked.
I answered that it was done for two reasons. First reason is out of strategy. I wanted to demonstrate the message of my lectures in my dressing. My cuisine, research and my activism are all based on AfroFuturism. It is also the way I live, as inspired by the best knowledge and practices of my ancestors that had been despised for many years and much of which has already been lost. I then add the numerous other lessons from the global village. For me to wear African clothes is the most sensible act as it compliments my commitment to eat and live internationally. I typically don’t do things just to the sake of acting. I can’t pretend that it is justice to normalize a suit. What extra performance do I gain when I wear a suit? Where is it written in stone that you are only acceptable and worthy of being taken seriously only when I wear a suit. It goes without saying that we perpetuate injustice by the clothes we wear without realizing it. For that reason, I am disrupting that injustice of normalizing the suit while making other attires abnormal. The British in India and Africa were against the locals weaving their own clothes so that they could support the textile industry of the British. The first major industry that propelled the British into an empire was the textile industry. That industry was largely subsidized by cheap cotton grown in the American south by enslaved Africans. I see the same injustice continuing to this day when Africans spend so much money on name brands while the health conditions in this community continue to experience serious health disparities. He who feeds you and clothes you rules you. The majority of the cotton used to make clothes today is done using GMO cotton or cotton grown with the use of toxic chemicals that are harmful to the environment. It is an opaque industry that gives us so much fiat joy.
Secondly, I dress in a way that sends the message of a concept I call “RIOF”, which simply stands for ratio of inside to outside fashion. That is simply comparing how much one puts on themselves as compared to what they put inside themselves. Resources being constant, a negative RIOF means that you are investing more on the outside than on the inside fashion. The goal is to have the highest positive number. It doesn’t mean that we should go naked by any means, but it is a matter worth looking at closely. I understand that this is not obvious to everyone and it does not just occur to me. I arrived at this observation after much study. It occurred to me that many people were so concerned with how they look to others and nowhere nearly as concerned about how they actually feel and look on the inside. That kind of thinking has very detrimental consequences on our health, our culture and our environment.
There are many other reasons but that is for another day. The middle aged White male agreed that he had no superior logic but actually learned something. A deal was reached. Had the job required that I wear the suit just because, I would have politely passed on the job. I cannot normalize oppression. After all, many of the crimes committed today are done on account of orders and laws passed by people wearing suits , titles under their names and mostly religious. Closely behind those with suits are the farmers, soldiers and those in chef coats, they play a major role in the fiat system. The beautiful news is that we are the ones who pay and authorize all the above people as consumers. If we decide not to consume anything they produce with injustice, a true religion would have dawned. One that we all can agree on and benefit from whether we shout about it or not. That is the only religion I aspire to. It’s a religion based on justice for all. That is what I call life worship. Today was not in vain if I managed to get one soul to even consider that religion as a possibility. If he hires me, it will be based on how I have dressed my stomach and my brain. That is major progress for anyone, leave alone an activist Africa like me. My branded cuisine is my fashion for the inside and outside. It is antithetical to the injustice to any toxic fashion, textile, brands and concepts. It is a journey and I am just starting. That pride comes before a fall is a fallacy only fit for theatre. In politics, otherwise known the economy of living, pride is a potent weapon. I adorn mine with regal abandon.