Why Are Most Vegan You Meet So Mean?

[JadeSpeedster17]

Mean, I don't hate vegans, I think that the 'vegan thumpers' of the group tend to get annoying.

I tried to debate one, used copy and past shit from Authority nutrition, and I admitted that 'yes it was a horrible idea and I'll admit to that'. I don't know everything I have to search, with what researcher I have done, I don't think I would benefit from a vegan diet and many others feel like me. And I was mocked by them 'Seem your research isn't not enough. You just searched up stuff to make your unethical self feel better'

All I said was that 'Not everyone can be vegan so stop trying to force it on me with facts that don't hold up.'
And I was accused of brushing off facts without addressing them when they did the same to me?

I'd think that is why some hate vegans. They meet a few who are just horrible and mean, telling them how unethical they are and it gets mean. I've seen this on youtube mostly. If you try and say 'Why not eat like a omnivore, in normal amounts?
"Then tell me oh wise one, what is normal amounts of meat?'

See what I mean?
Why are these people so mean? Is it just on youtube?

[brimstoneSalad]

If you approach argument in certain ways, you can find anybody to be mean. For example, it sounds like you might have responded defensively (in terms of rationaliztion) in the past, and particularly if you referenced bad resources like "authoritynutrition", you could have really frustrated people, and then they respond to that in a not very nice way.
Imagine a Christian arguing with an atheist, and the Christian keeps referencing the Bible as proof of God because the Bible says so. It can be very frustrating. The atheist might not always respond nicely. If you referenced "authoritynutrition" then that's the same kind of thing. It's a bad source, and of course it would frustrate people.

Mean, I don't hate vegans, I think that the 'vegan thumpers' of the group tend to get annoying.

Maybe you're mean to people you find annoying too?
When there are two sides arguing, each side may find the other to be mean due to frustration or annoyance.

You can change the way you discuss these things, and you can have more civil discussions. But that also means you have to do more work in researching to find credible sources.

I don't know everything I have to search, with what researcher I have done, I don't think I would benefit from a vegan diet and many others feel like me.

What if a Creationist says "I don't think I evolved from monkeys and many others feel like me." is that a good argument?
You aren't an expert in the field of nutrition, right? The same way many people don't know much about evolution. It's very frustrating when somebody tries to argue about something (in science) that they don't know much about and are going based on personal feelings and bad sources.

All I said was that 'Not everyone can be vegan so stop trying to force it on me with facts that don't hold up.'

What if somebody said, "Maybe you evolved from Monkeys, and that's good for you, but not everybody evolved from monkeys some of us were created by God and stop trying to force belief in evolution on me with facts that don't hold up!"? Would you find that to be a good argument?

When you said that 'not everyone can be vegan', you were making a claim.
I've never seen any evidence that there are people who physically can not be vegan. There are only people in certain situations where they don't have the means. Human beings need certain nutrients, we do not need certain sources of nutrients. Nobody needs meat unless they have no healthy vegan food to eat.

And I was accused of brushing off facts without addressing them when they did the same to me?

You probably didn't present any facts, though, if you were using "authoritynutrition".

Here's a good example of a fact:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19562864

This is a position paper of a body of many thousands of professionals, authored and approved by their top experts.

It is the position of the American Dietetic Association that appropriately planned vegetarian diets, including total vegetarian or vegan diets, are healthful, nutritionally adequate, and may provide health benefits in the prevention and treatment of certain diseases. Well-planned vegetarian diets are appropriate for individuals during all stages of the life cycle, including pregnancy, lactation, infancy, childhood, and adolescence, and for athletes. A vegetarian diet is defined as one that does not include meat (including fowl) or seafood, or products containing those foods. This article reviews the current data related to key nutrients for vegetarians including protein, n-3 fatty acids, iron, zinc, iodine, calcium, and vitamins D and B-12. A vegetarian diet can meet current recommendations for all of these nutrients. In some cases, supplements or fortified foods can provide useful amounts of important nutrients. An evidence- based review showed that vegetarian diets can be nutritionally adequate in pregnancy and result in positive maternal and infant health outcomes. The results of an evidence-based review showed that a vegetarian diet is associated with a lower risk of death from ischemic heart disease. Vegetarians also appear to have lower low-density lipoprotein cholesterol levels, lower blood pressure, and lower rates of hypertension and type 2 diabetes than nonvegetarians. Furthermore, vegetarians tend to have a lower body mass index and lower overall cancer rates. Features of a vegetarian diet that may reduce risk of chronic disease include lower intakes of saturated fat and cholesterol and higher intakes of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, nuts, soy products, fiber, and phytochemicals. The variability of dietary practices among vegetarians makes individual assessment of dietary adequacy essential. In addition to assessing dietary adequacy, food and nutrition professionals can also play key roles in educating vegetarians about sources of specific nutrients, food purchase and preparation, and dietary modifications to meet their needs.

That paper is largely authored by people who eat meat; this is not a biased organization, it's a body of the foremost professionals on human nutrition in the world.

You can see the health claims in that selection. They're fairly modest. Going vegan probably won't cure your cancer, and it won't fix every disease. But it can reduce your risk for many diseases, and if you plan it properly you can get all of your nutrients and be healthy.

Some vegans make exaggerated claims, like if you go vegan you'll never get cancer. That's not true, you'll just have a lower risk. It's like wearing a bullet proof vest won't make it so you'll never get killed by a bullet, it just lowers your risk.
The improved health and lowered risk of certain diseases is a good reason to go vegan. Ethics is an even better one, though.
If you do not need to kill animals to be healthy, why would you want to harm other sentient beings?

I'd think that is why some hate vegans. They meet a few who are just horrible and mean, telling them how unethical they are and it gets mean. I've seen this on youtube mostly. If you try and say 'Why not eat like a omnivore, in normal amounts?
"Then tell me oh wise one, what is normal amounts of meat?'

"What's a normal amount?" is a valid question. The amount of meat we require is 0.
It's possible to eat a small amount of meat and for it to be unlikely to kill you (like one serving a week) just like it's possible to smoke a small number of cigarettes (maybe one a week) and for it to be unlikely to give you lung cancer. But we do not need to eat any meat, and we do not need to smoke any cigarettes. Particularly as it harms others too, there's no good reason to do it.

See Hank Green on the topic of "why vegetarians are annoying" here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwKrtNr76BM
Unnatural Vegan also responded to it here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d3G6kyWNauQ

There are some good excuses for eating meat, like "I'm a minor living in a country without good child welfare laws and my parents will beat me if I don't eat it, when I'm older I'll go veg.", or "I'm an adult and I have no job or prospects, and my parents will kick me out if I don't eat it, once I can move out on my own I'll go veg." or "I'm disabled and can't work, I rely on food banks and while I try to get vegetarian things sometimes I have to accept meat to not starve."

There are no particular health conditions that make it impossible to be vegan, particularly if you include ostrovegan in there. The most difficult is a legume allergy, but even people with legume allergies can go vegan. Arguing that you can not be vegan for some nebulous and undefined health reason is only going to frustrate people.
Try to stick with what you know -- your life circumstances -- and ask for help instead of fighting about it, then people can help you learn how to go vegan and be vegan healthfully.

[JadeSpeedster17]

I guess that does make sense.

Me personally I just don't like the idea of a vegan diet. I know people in my life who won't benefit from a vegan diet as some have tried it and it just didn't help them, that's there experience they shared with me. Another thing I've noticed is that when I say 'I don't want to be vegan' I was always called 'animal killer'. That's kind of offensive and hateful, and isn't helping to prompt me to go vegan.

I was trying to be nice, I apologized for being mean, yet they were still hateful to me. It's hard for me to find the good in people who are always hateful to me.

[PsYcHo]

Mean, I don't hate vegans, I think that the 'vegan thumpers' of the group tend to get annoying.

Just as you are annoyed by the 'vegan thumpers', most people are annoyed by any 'thumper' of a group they are not associated with. In response to your question though, you have to realize that you may have met many Vegans, but they just didn't tell you, because they are not the 'thumper' types.

I'm not a Vegan myself, and I had the same impression as you about Veganism, but I learned that there is a big difference between those who "shout it from the mountain", and those who are just quietly Vegan.

I hope you hang around, and meet some rational Vegans.

[JadeSpeedster17]

I say 'thumpers' because it's a parallel to 'Bible Thumpers'
In my mind they act about the same, yelling at the mountain and at your face, though these are youtube commentators. I'll admit I'll be a mean for the sake of being mean at times. Other times I try to be rational and nice, instead I get called hateful name when I just want to have a discussion.

No one is without blame here. So it isn't 'all my fault' sometimes there are just people who are mean. But I'm wondering if the people who are quietly vegan realize that the people who yell the loudest make everyone else look bad. I mean, people on here are nice and reasonable, we all have our own opinion, be it right or wrong in the others mind.

Sometimes I'll just say the most absurd things, because everyone on youtube makes it so easy to get under their skin. But most of the time I try to give reasons for why I'm not Vegan and I get called some pretty hateful things even though I didn't do anything to deserve such names.

And I guess your right Psycho, but I was just wondering, and I the only one that sees them as the ones who make us look bad. Like the extremist for Christians, the loudest of the groups tend to be the ones that make the rest look bad.

[brimstoneSalad]

Me personally I just don't like the idea of a vegan diet.

There is no one vegan diet. There are as many varieties as there are vegans.

I know people in my life who won't benefit from a vegan diet as some have tried it and it just didn't help them, that's there experience they shared with me.

Are you talking about curing diseases?

Anybody can be at least as healthy as a vegan as they would be eating animal products if they have access to good vegan food. That doesn't mean it will cure all diseases.

Veganism is not about curing disease, it's about saving animals from unnecessary suffering and death, it's about protecting our environment, and about saving other humans from the consequences of our harmful actions on the world.

Eating meat hurts non-human animals, it hurts the environment, and it hurts other people.
Eating meat does not help people unless they are starving and have no vegan food (in which case of course they have to, but we should help them get vegan food).

It doesn't make sense to do it. Going vegan is not a selfish thing to help yourself, It's about trying to avoid harm to others.

Another thing I've noticed is that when I say 'I don't want to be vegan' I was always called 'animal killer'. That's kind of offensive and hateful, and isn't helping to prompt me to go vegan.

I don't think it's the most productive thing to say, but they are technically right: you know that, don't you?

When you say you want to buy and eat meat, you are saying you want to pay to have animals killed for you so you can eat their dead bodies -- it's how the system works.
How does paying somebody to kill animals for you not make you an animal killer?
If I pay somebody to murder another person, then I am a murderer myself.

It may be offensive, because sometimes the reality of the situation is offensive. The animal agriculture industry is offensive. Learning that you are contributing to that can be shocking.

I think they should use other ways of explaining it than that, but that doesn't mean it's untrue.

I was trying to be nice, I apologized for being mean, yet they were still hateful to me. It's hard for me to find the good in people who are always hateful to me.

You have the same problem they do.
It's hard to see good in somebody who is doing something mean, right?

It's hard for them to see good in you when you are killing animals. Imagine you saw somebody in front of you killing an animal. How would you respond? Would you consider that person good?
See it from their perspective. That's what they see when you say you want to eat meat. From their perspective you are being hateful to animals by causing them suffering for no good reason. So, because of this, they can not see good in you. Then they respond to you in this way, and you can not see good in them, and the cycle of hate continues.

Why don't you go vegan? If I can understand your situation and reasons, maybe I can help you. But so far you just said you don't like the idea... that's not really clear.

[ModVegan]

Mean, I don't hate vegans, I think that the 'vegan thumpers' of the group tend to get annoying.
Why are these people so mean? Is it just on youtube?

I think it's important to remember vegan YouTubers are self-selected- not everyone has a YouTube channel, and those who do tend to be more outspoken, since they did want to create vegan YouTube channels!

IRL I meet every kind of vegan imaginable. They tend to run the entire gamut of personalities, like any other group.

Of course, as Brimstone Salad implied, there is an important difference between veganism and most other religious, ethical or political communities. Since we are literally trying to convince people to stop killing other sentient beings for no reason other than pleasure, it gets frustrating for many. Imagine for a moment how you would feel about omnivores if you really, truly, deeply felt that animals were sentient beings with their own interests and desire to live. If one actually believes animals have as much right to life as any other beings on the planet, seeing them slaughtered wholesale can elicit far more emotional reactions than say, wanting people to believe in god or accept the validity of existential philosophy.

Also, many vegans never get past the angry new vegan phase - they quit out of exasperation before they have the chance to become more measured in their critique of omnivores.

[Vincent Berraud]

Every vegan I have met in real life has been lovely... and a lot of vegans I have seen on Facebook have been judgemental, pushy in a disrespectful way, dogmatic and entirely focussed on their own truth rather than taking their audience into account or accepting to listen to others.