I'm nice, you asshole!

I'd like to set the record straight on something that's bothered me for a long time. Not all vegetarians or vegans are snobby, preachy, self-righteous jerks.

I've been a vegetarian for nine years and a vegan for seven. A personal choice that had to do with health and my own ethics. I do not believe that my ethics should be everyone's ethics. I know people like meat, and quite frankly, it just doesn't bother me that people eat meat. Eat every warm-bodied thing you can find, it's no skin off my nose.

I leave people alone about food. I never try to convert people. I never make comments about what people eat. I don't boycott fast food restaurants. I don't announce that I'm vegan every chance I get. I don't make people feel bad. I don't wear t-shirts and tout bumper stickers. Nothing, nada, zip. People don't even know I'm a vegan unless we happen to eat out together.

It amazes me that vegans get a reputation for being asses when I've had my fair share of meat-eaters jump all over me for no reason. Who's the asshole now? I'm the first to admit there seem to be a lot of animal activists and militant vegans who hassle meat-eaters and they're giving normal people like me a bad name. Many assume that I have the same bad attitude as other vegans and the minute they find out I am one they put me down.

Those who get snippy with me about how dumb veganism is always go one of three routes: 1) the "it's the way nature is" route while droning on about the food chain; 2) the "God intended for people to eat meat" route while quoting the Bible; and 3) "it's not healthy to be vegan" route drabbling on about calcium and protien as if they're the only factors in human health.

The nature argument just doesn't suffice since there are many, many animals who don't eat other animals (even some of the strongest mammals on earth like elephants and silverback gorillas eat only plant-based foods). Nature's complex.

The God argument doesn't work for me because I was raised without religion and don't pay it any mind. Even if I were to pay it mind, there are religions and sects that demand or encourage vegetarianism. So whose side is God on?

Lastly, the nutrition argument. Ahhh, my favorite. I find it fascinating that at this time in U.S. history when people are fatter and nutritiously unhealthier than they've even been, some want to single me out as the person to give a health lecture to.

I'm not eating 95% of the foods that make people unhealthy. I'm not the broad who's going to have a heart attack from clogged arteries. I'm not the dude who has high cholesterol or diabetes. I'm not the one who weighs 500 pounds smothering in my own blubber. And people want to get on me about calcium and protein! Give me a break.

Take the nutrition lecture over to the 300-pound guy scarfing down the deep-fried-quadruple-steak-and-bacon-with-three-kinds-of-cheeses burger and two sides of jumbo fries plus a vat of ice cream for dessert. How many meat-eating people do you know who get the perfect amount of every vitamin, mineral, fat, protein, and everything else the human body needs every day anyway, huh? That's what I thought. No one's nutritionally perfect, including me, and that's precisely why I leave people alone about it.

Just so you know, there's at least one vegan out there (me) who doesn't give a rat's ass what you kill and eat, and am totally apathetic to your hunting, fishing, taxonomy, fur-coat wearing, bestiality, and whatever else. You walk your road, I'll walk mine.

Learnin' Time: Since calcium and protein seem to be what most non-vegans are obsessed with I thought I'd post a few facts just for your reading enjoyment.

Excellent non-dairy sources of calciumsoy or rice milk, cooked collard greens, blackstrap molasses, tofu, calcium-fortified orange juice, cooked kale, tahini, almonds and almond butter, okra, sesame seeds, turnip greens, soybeans, figs, tempeh, broccoli, bok choy, soy yogurt, and more

Excellent non-animal sources of proteinAlmost all foods except for alcohol, sugar, and fats are good sources of protein. Vegan sources include potatoes, whole wheat bread, rice, broccoli, spinach, almonds, peas, chickpeas, peanut butter, tofu, soy milk, lentils, kale, and more.

Okay, I feel better after having ranted.