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Comment by lagadu | Hacker News Reader

The problem with vegans is that there is a small but extremely vocal minority that absolutely, positively just HAS to incessantly preach about it and try to belittle everyone else. As a consequence whenever someone who has heard about militant vegans immediately associates veganism in general with them exclusively simply because non-insane vegans (which I believe are the very large majority of vegans, though I have no data about it) are woefully underrepresented in the public consciousness of veganism.

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This sounds more like a problem with people jumping to unfounded conclusions than with vegans, doesn't it? I'll admit I used to be one of those even though I'd never even met a vegan, and now that I have met literally hundreds (used to work in a vegetarian coffee shop) I've yet to meet a single one of these so called militant vegans who won't leave you alone before you've listened to all their arguments about what a bad person you are.

Where I'm at there's a tendency to think of (US) Americans as fat, obnoxious people who will sue their own mother if that will get them some of the money they are so obsessed with, would you say this a problem with Americans or (as I believe) a problem rooted in lazy thinking, stereotyping and general prejudice?

Stereotypes exist whether we like them or not and they're always rooted in a kernel of truth. People form stereotypes based on what they see around them, nobody has the time or patience to figure out whether some dude gesturing in the street waving a bible around with a cardboard cutout saying "chemtrails" actually has a good and nuanced argument about whatever he's talking about, we just assume that they're another looney.

Hell, stereotypes are part of the what made us so successful a species today, we'd have been in trouble had our ancestors decided to figure out whether every sabretooth tiger they saw was actually just a kitten who wanted nothing but cuddles and love so the unconscious creation of them is a pretty deeply rooted defense mechanism.

Indeed. I think the issue is being vegan these days is not just about eating exclusively plant-based food, but a sort of political statement. I wish there would be a short, separate term to distinguish the two.

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