Fear of Black Planet

    So what is "fear of a black planet"? "Fear of a black planet" is a conspiracy theory based on racism.  The idea behind "fear of a black planet" is that basically black people would out produce white people.  Our crazy band legend/ conspiracy theories were in the 1980s and involved the chain restaurant Church's Chicken.  The theory was that it was owned by the KKK and they had a recipe that would cause black people to become sterile if they ate their chicken.

     There are a couple of reasons that people started to believe the legend/ conspiracy.  The first one is that the franchise was located primarily in neighborhoods with the high concentration of blacks.  The chain also did little advertising as compared to other fast food companies.  

     The second reason was because, being a southern based company, it offered a southern menu that commonly identified with the African American home kitchen.  By doing that, Church's had transgressed into a somewhat sacred territory.  Therefor, when people heard the rumor, they totally believed the clan was more than capable of carrying out such a well-divided plan.  

     Yet another reason the public would even entertain the idea that there could be truth behind this legend/conspiracy is that it emerged in a country with a long history of sterilizing low-income blacks without their consent, and sometimes even without their knowledge.  At the earliest point that the story is known to have circulated, some states still had sterilization laws on the books. 

     Even though the Church's chicken conspiracy theory has been disproven, there actually is an element of truth to the sterilization practice.  This is important because people think conspiracy theories are some what ridiculous, but they often start from a bit of truth.  

                                                                  Works Cited:

Ionerlogan. “Black Conspiracy Theories 101: Church’s Fried Chicken Will Make You Sterile?” News One, News One, 22 June 2012, newsone.com/2018343/black-urban-legends-churchs-fried-chicken/.

Walker, Jesse. “Conspiracies: Five Things They Don’t Want You to Know – The Boston Globe.” BostonGlobe.com, 20 Oct. 2013, www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2013/10/19/conspiracies-five-things-they-don-want-you-know/RDNUIkp1GW095aSJ2THRGK/story.html.