It's funny that vegans are often accused of being "angry" (just like the "angry atheists" or the "angry leftists"), because the anger in the comments so far (and in the original article) seems to be coming almost entirely from the omnivores.

I can only guess at what drives such anger. Many of you seem to be angry at self-righteous vegans trying to impose their lifestyle on you. As far as I know there is only one vegan in congress, and he alone has no authority to dictate what you can or cannot eat. And in fact, there is no vegan that I know of who would want to use the law or any other fascistic means to force you to stop eating anything.

As far as I can tell, when a vegan is giving you some facts or expressing an opinion, all they're doing is having a dialogue. If you don't like the tone of their rhetoric, or you don't like what they have to say, then you can respond in kind. But all of this irrational anger every time there is a vegan opinion piece in a popular forum suggests that it is not vegans who have issues with anger or self-righteousness.

Unlike, say, the people who have been actively trying to criminalize abortion for the past 40 years, no one is trying to criminalize your subjugation of animals and your consumption of their decaying carcasses. If you wish to go on doing this, that is your business. But there are many good reasons to stop, and if you're willing to put aside your bigotry towards all those "uppity / hypocritical / self-righteous / skinny / malnourished / misguided / etc." vegans trying to tell you "what to do," then you might actually begin to consider the issue from a different, more objective, less angry perspective.

I've been a vegan now for 14 years, and while I am not a morally pure or perfect person, I could not live with myself if I was purposefully and intentionally causing the subjugation and death of other sentient beings simply because of what I eat or wear. Instead of fixating on vegans so much, maybe some of you angry omnivores should ask yourselves why it is that you are so eager to cause so much pain, suffering and death to so many innocent beings.

At its core, being a vegan means that you reject the popular mindset which says that the non-humans of the world exist solely to serve or be used by us. All of the angry arguments about the perceived political or liberal or elitist bias of Ms. Portman do not address that in any way. Nor do the angry comments about some unnamed people trying to take your freedom from you. In fact, maybe you should have an omnivore tea party if you're so upset about it. I'm sure Fox would cover it.

You can continue to get angry at vegans, or you can stop and consider your own deep-seated and irrational biases against the other sentient beings on the planet. Because how you consider and treat others is entirely your choice, and like all moral decisions, it reflects entirely upon you.

Forget the Mayan calendar - when Bill-O is the voice of reason in a discussion, clearly the end times are upon us.

I wish I would have remembered that this was happening. If I had, I would have gone to a college and pretended to be a student. Then I could have a gotten a great book for free!

Who reads intros anyway?

The Humane Society is not an animal rights organization. Its main efforts are spent on advocating animal welfare regulations and pursuing lawsuits such as this one. These kinds of things only serve to draw attention to the poor treatment of animals, not to the idea that the animals have the right to be free from human exploitation and use altogether.

And while the HSUS may have millions of dollars at its disposal, the animal agriculture industry has billions of dollars at its disposal. This is the second thing in recent memory I've read which suggests that there are these juggernaut animal rights organizations with apparently enormous political power trying to trample our poor, defenseless family farmers. I can only say that there are Davids and Goliaths in play here, but the Goliath in this case is the agriculture industry which has most of the government in its back pocket (and which receives massive subsidies from that government), not any non-profit animal welfare organizations.

More importantly, the HSUS has absolutely refused to engage in any kind of campaign that would encourage people to go vegan or adopt any kind of animal rights stance.

In the end this particular lawsuit may or may not do anything for the treatment of animals. And if it really is simply a math error, then this may amount to nothing at all. But if there is some serious environmental problem happening with this particular farm, I would think that everyone here would want to know about it.