Minority Rights for Meat-eaters!

I believe it is time for the oppressed minority of meat-eaters to stand up for ourselves. Already in the forward-thinking USA, known worldwide for its protection of minorities (look what they've done for the Negroes and Indians), it is illegal to criticise the meat industry. Meat-eaters, as neither an ethnic nor a religious minority, find it difficult to gain recognition as the dietary minority that we are.

Being in perhaps a 1% minority in this country, the chances are that on average 99% of people a meat-eater meets will be raving, shouting, bomb-wielding vegans who snatch burgers out of their hands, hold them down and force-feed them organic beansprouts and curly kale. The overwhelming vegan majority, on the other hand, can largely take their lifestyle for granted as nearly everyone else is doing the same thing. To be a meat-eater in this country is to be forced to continually justify our way of life to nearly everyone we talk to.

Walking down any high street, the meat-eater is constantly bombarded by advertisements for the vegan lifestyle. Nearly every bus stop has a poster for Kentucky Fried Chickpeas or McTofu, while an endless series of pubs and restaurants parade their discriminatingly meat- and dairy-free menus. In this world where every high street has two or three independent wholefood shops selling organic fruit, veg, grains, beans, nuts and seeds, the meat-eater has to painstakingly seek out specialist supermarket suppliers to obtain a juicy piece of reconstituted factory-farmed carcass byproducts bound with synthetic fillers, laced with antibiotics, and sterilised with ammonia. The vegan lobby has overwhelming political power: the tempeh industry alone is worth hundreds of pounds a week, and contributed ten pounds last year to the Vegan Society.

We demand that meat-eaters be recognised as a dietary minority, and that acts of non-consumption of animal products, or incitement to non-consumption of animal products, should be recognised as hate crimes against us.