Thanks for an interesting post. Since I mostly agree I wasn't going to comment, but I found the "proselytizing at the kitchen table" comment a bit curious. If you just happen to serve a fully vegetarian meal, how is that prozelytizing? Seems as if you just did it without calling attention to it, it'd be just 'a meal'? Not sure what you're referring to...

There is no right or wrong approach. There are a lot of approaches and they all influence us whether we consider them wrong and overly antagonistic or right because they're compassionate.

For instance, sometimes we need to ask people for respect and sometimes you need to say, "I'm fed up and can't take it anymore." The opportunities for growth and love come in many different shapes and sizes

I have successfully sneaked in vegetables at the dinner table. (And the breakfast table - zucchini requires creativity.) What I'm averse to is the stereotypical "Oh, you eat meat, you're a BAD PERSON" attitude. Ditto for many other things that people become evangelical about - religion, politics, operating systems, editors, and so on. I'm happy to let people have avid discussions at my tea get-togethers as long as they can agree or disagree respectfully. (Also, I like bacon, so adopting a holier-than-thou attitude is internally inconsistent. ;) )

I try to avoid that attitude myself, tending more towards the "Thanks for sending that file! Have you thought about using Lotus Connections inside IBM to make it easy to send files and updates to lots of people?" rather than "Oh, you send files by e-mail, you're a BAD PERSON."
(Not that I'm equating vegan philosophy with collaboration here. I just find it useful to illustrate the situation with examples from personal experience.) I tend towards "I happen to really like Emacs!" rather than "You use vi. You suck." (You can do really cool things with vi, too.) This is also why I'm deliberately responding to that kind of comment with "Here's how you can argue that more effectively" rather than "Your logic is sloppy. You suck." =)

Not disputing the attitude issue, but not what I was trying to ask about.
The idea that lack of meat has to be justified is what seems to be the underlying issue.
So if a meal just happens to have no meat, that provokes ?? by the meat expecting/entitled?
Just trying to tease out what is considered normal/expected and how a meal with no meat presented without comment is proselytizing...

Ah, that makes it clearer. No, vegetarian/vegan meals aren't usually remarkable/controversial by themselves. =)

If you follow a strict vegetarian or vegan diet, then it's a good idea to make sure other people know about your dietary restrictions, like the way you'd tell friends what you're allergic to before you go out to eat or before they prepare dinner. One of my friends is vegan, and I treat his dietary restrictions as like I treat allergies or religious restrictions - I make sure there's always something there that everyone can enjoy, so people don't feel like they have to sit in the corner eating their own food.

Some people go overboard on this, not just telling people about their dietary preferences but also using it as a soapbox to tell other people what their dietary preferences should be. That's when it becomes a source of conflict. I appreciate that people can feel quite passionate about it and may even want to "save" other people from their lifestyle choices, but that's not an extreme I want to go to. There are perfectly reasonable people who follow vegetarian or vegan diets without becoming overbearing, of course, and my friend is a good example of that.

The strangest thing is that there are some issues on which many people will try to change your mind. Food is one of them. Religion (or the lack of it) is another. Ah, well!

Ok. I find it odd when you said "I don’t think I’ll ever follow a strict vegetarian or vegan diet, though, because I don’t like inconveniencing friends and family, or proselytizing at the kitchen table." since it seems to imply that vegetarians/vegans are inherently proselytizers. I find that not true, and was wondering what was behind it. I'm not even sure how the lack of meat at a meal is a inconvenience. Perhaps I'm trying to unpack more than is there, but the meat-centric viewpoint it seems to hold is quite fascinating...

Actually, people can be unreasonable either way. Most people aren't, thankfully, but it's not unheard of for people who enjoy meat to pester or mock people who choose not to, just as it's not unheard of for people who don't to pester or mock people who do.

It's one of those situations where people might perceive your personal choices to be a criticism of theirs. I've had people react that way to something as seemingly straightforward as reflecting on my own teaching methods. I've also dealt with a lighter form of shaming from my sister, who used to tease me about being square because I don't like alcohol. Easy enough to handle: rise above it. I can't control other people's reactions, but I can choose how I deal with my own decisions. So I'll prefer to eat certain things, but I don't feel the urge to raise that preference to the same level as an ethical, religious, or allergy-based restriction.

I do let my personal choices influence the way I live and the social interactions I have with other people. =) For example, this is why I don't hang out with friends in clubs, indulge in social retail therapy, or eat out on a regular basis. So it's not that I'm running away from conflict, it's that I've considered the different factors and decided that this particular decision isn't something I'm going to stress out about for now.

What would be a better way of phrasing that so that I can condense the explanations from this wonderful conversation into that statement?

Thank you for the conversation and explanations.

I"m not sure I understand the nuances, but I think I hear you saying that "if I simply have/serve meals with no meat, my family/friends will/may consider that to be a criticism to their choice to eat meat and that impression/awareness/etc. will create discord/strife/conflict" ...?

Perhaps "I choose not be vegetarian/vegan because in my social circles the absence of meat at meals (in and of itself, without pointing it out) creates conflict/stress/conversations/ that I would rather/choose to avoid."

I'm not sure about the self-(in)consistency thing, since I am guessing that you do buy things from time to time, or that you do eat out occasionally, and yet doing so does not invalidate your choices when choose not to? Wanting to eat meat, liking eating meat, doesn't mean you have to choose to eat it. Nor does it mean that choosing not to eat it is a lie. It is a choice. I'm a part-time vegetarian, I choose to not eat meat whenever I can. But I don't use any of the 'veg' labels anymore since so many people have baggage around those terms...

At this point I suspect the issue maybe to nuanced for a simple sentence summary... :-)

It's not so much what I serve or don't serve. People don't particularly care what's in front of them, as long as it doesn't give them food poisoning. ;) (Which is one of the reasons I serve mostly vegetable-based dishes, actually. =)

It's more about, say, when I'm in other people's domains - going out with friends and family, or eating dinner at their place - that being strictly vegetarian or strictly vegan can lead to the occasional difficulty. For example, I've seen my friend have to deal with sorely lacking choices at restaurants, asking waitstaff to make sure the ingredients are all vegan-friendly, and sometimes have a hard time finding a nearby restaurant that accommodates everyone's dietary restrictions while having more than a salad. I deal with that by making him pick the place if we're meeting up outside, because he's much more likely to know where he can get good stuff to eat. ;)

Personally, I'm cool with eating (mostly) whatever's handy, although I've recently discovered that being philosophically opposed to drinking pop, overpriced bottled water, or "vitamin-enriched water" is enough to get me slightly annoyed about the lack of a drinking fountain in Dufferin Mall when I forgot to bring a water bottle. (I ended up buying a can of coconut water from No Frills.)

I choose to prefer what I eat, but not require it. As I'm fortunate enough to not have strong dietary restrictions yet, I'll stay that way. =)

Also, if a friend is particularly proud of his Japanese-style ribs, I will totally go ahead and enjoy those ribs. =) If my husband roasts a chicken, I will eat the chicken. (He ate my experimental cucumber soup. I think I've got the easier end of this bargain.) If I'm planning to have friends over, I'm fine with putting together egg tarts and vegan biscuits - whatever I'm curious about sharing, as long as everyone's got something to enjoy.

Ok, well, none of that sounds like you'd proselytize at the kitchen table anyways. :-)
Thanks for the explanations!