I have a complex and interesting perspective here, I think. I wanted to be a vegetarian as a child but my parents would not let me. I immediately went veg as soon as I went to college. As the years passed, this becmae much more about being anti-factory farm and pro-environment and much less about animal rights. I still very occasionally ate some seafood--only if it was considered eco-OK. I never ate anything I thought I couldn't kill myself.

Meat has come a long way and I now very occasionally eat chicken and some fish--only free-range, and I prefer local, truly free-range. We also own chickens, who we love and cherish and could not imagine eating, yet at the same time, I am okay with the general idea of eating well-treated chickens.

My daughter is very very vegetarian. Now, we really never talk any animal rights anything. I guess it's just a product of being raised veg and coming to her own conclusions. She does get offered meat (she is allowed to eat whatever she wants) and she very, very rarely takes it.

She would never, ever, eat an animal she knew. This would really, really upset her to the point of hysteria, I am very sure. I can't imagine making her eat meat in this situation. I do not believe in "making" kids eat anything, though, per se, though I realize that a child switching to veg is no small thing (and I don't really blame my parents for saying no to me when I asked).

And yet she does catch and eat fish.

Um, yeah, our family is complicated.