Hello guys,

I recently had a converstion with a close friend of mine and we asked ourselves how far is veganism spreaded in the different countries in Africa and what are go to meals? Thanks for your help in advance :))

This is for the Pan Africanists as a genuine question. One core tenant of Pan Africanism is solidarity across those on the continent and in the diaspora and people have pointed out the issues and hurdles that will come with that but no one ever talks about this.

The African continent is notoriously anti LGBTQ+ with many countries imprisoning and killing members of the community, things baked into their legislation, and many citizens in these countries either being apathetic or approving of it.

Meanwhile many African Americans and those of the diaspora outside the continent seem to be pro LGBTQ + or rather at least more progressive than our people have shown to be.

Is this a point of tension that might be a threat to African solidarity? and what are the common responses to this from Pan Africanists?

Is it being talked about as much?

There’s this Swahili expression: Kila mcheza ngoma huivuta ngozi kwake(Every drum player pulls the hides towards themselves); that people look to benefit themselves through a social advantage, sometimes even as it comes at the expense of others.

I believe this is what makes the broaching of the difficulties that actually face African countries sensitive: that said difficulties are treated as a coveted pie that everyone stands to gain social acceptance from partaking in. That even as we want to shed light on areas that the world tends to forget, we always walk a thin line in ensuring that what we say is not used to benefit the biases that the world holds against us. That we always anticipate loaded questions stemming from a place of ignorance as we strive to defend our honour, our humanity.

That kept in mind, the key question now becomes: How do people in different African countries respond to non-Africans knowing, or wanting to know, about their social issues? At what point does the conversation set them on edge?

Like musicians that generations of artsy types have all agreed “yeah that’s cool” like The Velvet Underground in the US?

Not necessarily super popular but critical darlings.