"Why are you a vegetarian?" is a question often asked by your friends, family, and loved ones as if you belonged to a rare cultist movement from a far away land. Someday the question will be, “Why do you eat meat?” as the minority will be those that consume animals and their byproducts.
But until then you would like to have a repertoire of answers at the ready to defend your diet as well as educate the inquiry party. Easy to do. The reasons are plentiful and concrete. The following fifty should cover just about any circumstances. The hope is that your answer will spur further interest, inquiry, and conversation, and bring them closer to your point-of-view.
When all else fails, though, and you just can’t get through to them, there is one answer that often leaves them thinking, “Because Nature made me that way, which means, you are a vegetarian, too.”