Seen a lot of posts on Lemmy with vegan-adjacent sentiments but the comments are typically very critical of vegan ideas, even when they don’t come from vegans themselves. Why is this topic in particular so polarising on the internet? Especially since unlike politics for example, it seems like people don’t really get upset by it IRL
Because of the trope that vegans are pretentious twats that publicly chastise anyone not vegan.
Like most things it’s one of those situations that’s blown out of proportion and the vast majority of us will never interact with a preachy vegan. I’ve encountered many vegans in the wild and they’ve most all been decent people, and I love picking their brains for decent vegan or vegetarian foods. I don’t mind vegan/vegetarianism, it’s just not easy to do well, so it helps to talk to people who do it for real. That said, I have encountered a few that are on the preachy side, but whatever. They’re no different than the tool who has the “eat tasty animals” bumper sticker and the like.
All the vegans and vegetarians I’ve met in real life were chill dudes and dudettes. One was an engineer and semi-pro skateboarder that was always making people feel good and happy. Another one was a solid rock climber always smiling.
I know more annoying people complaining about vegans, always grumpy and being proud of always eating meat. I also know this cool swing dance instructor girl who only eats meat, so it’s also good.
I actually know a vegan engineer and vegetarian rock climber, too! Had several great dinners and lunches with them both!
Yep. It’s not the way of life, it’s the pretentious self-righteousness, and most people aren’t that way. Is like the ‘bad Christians’ fucking it up for all the ones that are basically love-and-forgiveness believers that are largely benign.
Most people - Christians, vegans, meat eaters, or whatever - are generally pretty chill. It’s the inciters that suck.