Once obese himself (he tipped the scales at 288 pounds), Gregory has recently launched a national anti-obesity campaign. Satya caught up with Gregory as he was performing his Off-Broadway, one-man show Dick Gregory Live.
Q: I understand that you’re a fruitarian.
A: The great thing is that it goes in and out of the upper and lower colon in 22 minutes, so that in 44 minutes you get the benefits of it; whereas, with anything else, it takes four hours in the upper colon, four hours in the lower colon, and it takes approximately eight hours plus to digest it. One day when we really research it, we’ll find out how much of our energy is depleted through eating the wrong foods.
Q: So you’re a 100% raw foodist?
A: My whole thing is that when you cook anything or freeze anything, you destroy the nutrients in it. If you serve a child raw fruit and vegetables without salad dressing, they’ll go for the fruit, and they’ll never eat anything but fruit. Salad dressing covers up the flavor of vegetables. But you need salad dressing to slip the vegetables past your tastebuds. That’s why there’s a trillion dollar industry in salad dressings.
Q: With fruit on the other hand, you don’t need flavor enhancers or dressings to sneak it past your tastebuds?
A: Absolutely.