I have experienced that some of the cruelest, most proud, and pitiless people I have ever met have been vegetarians - whereas, some of the kindest, and most self-effacing have been meat-eaters: the following is born of these observations:
Vegetarianism/veganism, which should in fact be an expression, or a symptom, of the development of one's love for all beings, sometimes transpires to be little more than a fad, or, more commonly, is revealed as mere ritualistic acceptance, and/or a way of (often unconsciously) showing one's self-assumed moral and spiritual superiority.
For some Hindus, and others, it is enough to refrain from the consumption of meat, fish, and fowl, whilst holding the view, and demonstrating by one's behaviour, that our fellow brothers and sisters around the globe are lower than animals - sometimes even worthy of death at the hands of the 'righteous' - by dint of their religious or political beliefs, their castelessness, their nationality/race, their sexuality, or indeed, their diet!
(I have also seen a kindred type of misanthropy in non-Hindus, exhibited by people who are apt to cry over the fate of lab-mice, or balk at the idea of someone hunting and eating a pheasant - yet think nothing of the termination of a human life in the womb by it's mother.)
All of this is possible when our vegetarianism is not the the natural outcome of a growing tenderness towards all beings - or in other words, all difference as grounded in Being, who reveals Him/Herself in, as, and with every time/event and entity - but is only a matter of fashion, a phobia, or an obsession with purity, or some similarly small-minded sanctimoniousness, which conspires to take us far, far away from that incalculable life of Love, which is the birthright of humankind.
