It’s time to put this conversation to rest. Our mama’s raised us right, so many Black people put up with our kinfolk behaving in low class, uncouth and uncivilized ways for far too long. But no more. As my grandmother once said, conjuring Zora Neal Hurston, ‘all skinfolk ain’t kinfolk.’ It is time, once and for all, to draw a line in the sand. This may upset many of you. But sugar does NOT go in grits.
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I know that many of you are upset right now. That’s OK. You weren’t raised right. But let me break this down so it will forever and consistently be broke and give you three reasons why people who do this need their Black cards revoked until they repent for their sins Blackdom.
Remember where they came from
Let’s start here. Grits are from the South. Native Americans introduced them European settlers, but it is the Gullah Geechee people who really embraced it and introduced it to Black America. And you know what all these people from diverse backgrounds did NOT do? Put sugar in them.
Originally grits were prepared with butter, salt, and pepper. If you were bougie, you got to put cheese in them. I don’t know what Black people were doing in Chicago or L.A. after they travelled there during the Great Migration, but if you were born south of the Mason-Dixon Line and your grandmother saw you putting sugar in your grits, she wouldda slapped the taste out yo mouth.
Grits are not cereal
This needs to be said clearly. They are not Froot Loops, Frosted Flakes or Fruity Peebles. Nor are they pancakes, waffles or even oatmeal, something that needs either fruit or brown sugar to be edible. Stop treating them like they are something other than what they are.
Remember when they are at their best
I’ve never had a sweet shrimp and grits. And if I were ever to be served that abomination, I would spit the food out my mouth at the table walk out the door without paying the bill. Some things are simply unacceptable.
Savory grits complement things like fried fish, shrimp, or sausage. That’s when the ground corn is at its best. You put sugar in a dish like that, and you would get shot faster than if you cheated in a game of dominoes at a juke joint in Mississippi.
Look, it’s simple. Don’t disrespect the ancestors. There are just things you should never do. Putting raisins in potato salad is one. Overcrowding the pan when frying chicken is another. (That’s why your chicken turns out soggy.) Putting sugar in grits is on that list.
In fact, if Black Moses was taking you to the promised land and saw that you put sugar in your grits when you all stopped to get some rest, she might have left you behind and let massa take you back to the plantation. It’s that serious.
Straight From 
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