[DoveInGrey]

For those of you who haven't read Tom Regan's interview in the Winter 2006 edition of the Vegan magazine, let me explain...

There are 3 basic ways people come to be AR campaigners/vegans...

Da Vincian- from early in life, gut instinct told you cruelty to animals was wrong(like Leonardo DaVinci) (This is me- I went veggie at 12)

Damascan- an event in life caused an epiphany and change of lifestyle(like the story in the bible)

Muddler- no real event... just eventually made the decision (this is Tom Regan himself- he says he used to eat all types of meat and even had a job in a butchers' as a student)

Cast your vote in the poll now!

 

[Sevenseas]

Muddler.

 

[GhostUser]

A combination of Da Vincian with a little bit of Damascan I think.

I became a vegeterian when I was 12, vegan a few years later. Although I had always felt guilty when I ate meat, I think my father had a lot to do with my decision.

He worked in a meat factory when I was growing up, and he always told me exactly what went on in there. He liked teasing me about it - for example, one christmas, he took the turkey he was about to cook and pretended it was dancing to christmas carols. Seeing the corpse of an animal, with its head chopped off and its feathers plucked out, being made to dance .... I could weep just thinking about it even now.

I think I would have become vegan anyway, my father was just the catalyst.

PS. I should point out - although my Dad did have kind of a sadistic streak, he was also very supportive of my veganism (after he got used to the idea). he was of the hippy generation, and he loved that I was thinking for myself and choosing to do something that went aggainst the majority.

 

[isowish]

I guess 'Da Vincian'? I've always had pets and though I was a meat-lover as a kid I used to say stupid things like "I think it's WRONG to buy fur. Eating meat is okay because people need to eat meat, but fur is just CRUEL."

So yeah, it took me a while to make the connection properly but I always felt for animals.

 

[Lelena]

Da Vincian

 

[compassionate1]

I'm with isowish, I guess (if I'm interptreting correctly). I didn't go veg until I was about 19, but I always had a bad feeling about eating meat. I remember being much younger and eating hamburger and just thinking there was something bizarre about my food being part of a cow.