Fair Fight

Let's have it out already. Look, people,

I shave my legs, armpits, and nether region;
I don't wear patchouli, flow-y skirts, or jewelry with bells or turquoise;
I don't drive a Volkswagen bus;
I don't smoke weed (anymore);
I don't favor Burning Man over Bora Bora;
I love Tiffany and Company;
I love my iPhone;
I love J.Crew -
yes, I'm a label whore -
I still have my original copy of The Official Preppy Handbook;
I love going to the dentist;

so can everyone please stop comparing me to tree-hugging hippie weirdos? (Although, in all fairness, I do love trees. I climbed them as a child and maybe the hours of entertainment they provided was something I never got over.) I'm a vegan, not a hippie.

Oh! Oh! Oh! you're thinking, and I'm sure you do think you have me on technicality, because I used to be a hippie. Rest assured, I was only a hippie because I was lazy. It was never about the politics.

So stop it with the jokes, the criticisms, and the judgments.

Enough is enough. I know, I know, it's easy to make fun of something you don't and could never understand. Isn't that the fear talking, though? As you stuff animals and their unbelievable diets, their antibiotics, their horrible living conditions into your mouth, isn't it really the fear of not stuffing animals, their unbelievable diets, their antibiotics, their horrible living conditions into your mouth that makes it so appealing to make fun of people like me?

How about we strike a deal? You learn a little something about the food you ingest - I know, we're back to the fear again, but I promise information is nothing to be afraid of; it cannot hurt you - and then maybe we can have a fair fight. Because right now, your ignorance is so hysterical that every time I see someone stuffing chicken into their mouth - yes, there is poop in all the animals, I mean "meat", you eat - it's all I can do not to roll onto the floor, holding my stomach because it hurts from laughing. Your God-fearing ignorance of how His creatures are being treated is so hilarious it's all I can do not to slap you on the back in good, clean fun. And your ignorance of the diseases that are linked to factory farming animals and their by-products is so over-the-moon ha ha ha, it's all I can do to keep a straight face at your funeral.

And you feed this shit to your children. That gets the heartiest laugh of all.

Put up your dukes, 'cause I'm coming out swingin'.