Vegans are a group of people who are seemingly widely maligned by absolutely everyone, and I wouldn't even limit that to just non-vegans. When you really think about what a vegan stands for, there's not really a lot to be angry about, they simply don't eat meat, right? Oh wait, they completely abstain from every single product that has in any way been involved with an animal at any time during production. It's sort of an admirable quest to undertake, given just how ridiculously tasty most things which come from animals tend to be. But of course, even just the very lifestyle of a vegan is a source of great disdain for the general population, and there's two major reasons as to why. First, there appears to be a built in broken part of our brains which tells us it's not only acceptable to be offended by the idea of someone not eating meat, milk etc. for anything other than medical reasons, but it also seems to be an understood social duty to attempt to correct the vegan in question. I present to you the best kind of scenario for demonstrating this: you bring your girlfriend/boyfriend friend of the animals home to meet your parents for the very first time, and as food is about to be served, they reveal that they cannot take part in the delicious carnivorous feast in front of them. I can guarantee that the first thing that will happen will be an awkward pause from mother, quickly interrupted by a brutal "not even a bit of cow?" from father. Second, whether applicable to all vegans or not, there is an enormous amount of pretentiousness which is assigned to a person the very second they reveal themselves to be a plant-hater. It's a social status which strikes us as being holier than thou in every single way, as the vegan has to announce themselves at every opportunity where food is concerned; even if that's simply to say that they don't want to eat bacon (a crime in itself), all those who hear this declaration are united in believing that the fancy veggie is showing off their higher plain of culinary consciousness. More tasty pigs for us, I guess.
