On Getting Razzed

We all have people in our lives that feel the need to pick, poke, and prod us about our personal preferences and habits. I have found this to be especially true since becoming a vegetarian. Fortunately, many of these people fall into a few tidy categories that can easily be dealt with once you understand their modus operandi.

1. The “Concerned.” These are the people who believe going vegetarian is a bad idea. The concern is generally health related, believing the notion that one needs to eat animal products in order to be healthy, which is not true. Since these folks generally only have good intentions and my best interests at heart I cut them some slack and respond to their concerns with quiet respect.

2. The “Competitors.” These people have to win arguments all the time and feel the need to comment on my food choices in order to feel superior to me rather than express genuine concern. They are more difficult to deal with, especially when I have personal knowledge of their eating habits. Arguing gets me nowhere with them, but I usually find it is worth the effort to put forth a single, forceful argument simply to let them know that I am not an idiot and they aren’t going to get the better of me in a debate.

3. The “Conservatives.” For some reason political conservatives have gotten it cemented into their heads that being a vegetarian is liberal, and that the only appropriate thing to do with an animal is kill it and grill it. Generally speaking, eating meat is not any more political than eating Cheerios, and any political argument against vegetarianism can be easily dismantled.

4. The “Clowns.” These are the people that may fall into one of the above categories but make their arguments/concerns known by poking fun rather than using a more straightforward method. They are easily disarmed by playing along or using humor in response, since, like the elementary school boys who tease the prettiest girls in the class (and I have A LOT of experience there! Ha!), they just want to get a reaction.

With any form of communication, to be effective you have to know your audience. Know your audience and you can take on the slings and arrows of anti-vegetarianism just as well as if you were wearing Wonder Woman’s really cool bullet-proof bracelet thingies. Then perhaps the clowns in your life will stop clowning and the competitors will stop . . . I can’t even finish writing that sentence and pretend to be serious.

Question: Have any of you faced and verbal challenges to your eating habits? What did you find to be an effective response?