TIFU by making my child vegetarian.

[u/CompetitionExtreme36]

I have a 6 year old son. We went to a fair a few months ago and there was a display of livestock that the public could pet.

Me, trying to be jolly, told him that he'd be eating them for dinner someday.

My son was shocked and asked me how was that possible. I told him that meat is made by killing animals and cooking them. He then asked me what all the meats were. I told him that it's chicken, beef, steak, sausages, salami and mutton.

Later that night at home, I noticed him seperating his dinner. He removed all the meat pieces from the rice and only ate the rice. My wife asked him what was wrong and he said he doesn't want to eat animals.

Thankfully, he's fine with milk and eggs. However, he continued refusing to eat any meat. A week passed and we went to the doctor. The doctor said that it's probably just a temporary phase and we should feed him vegetarian alternatives for the time being.

We now buy canned beans, lentils, greek yoghurt, olive oil, whey protein, soy nuggets and plant-based patties/sausages. We also order a cheese pizza for him.

It's been a few months now, and I've bought iron and B12 gummies for him. Even my wife and I are starting to go more vegetarian.

TL;DR: We went to a fair and there was a display where the crowd could pet livestock. I told my son he'd eat those animals soon, and he's a full blown vegetarian now.

[u/Cherimbba]

Kids are so funny, I’ve had to steer my kid somewhat the other way as he fully leaned into “we are the apex and kill and eat everything” which was pretty weird haha

[u/FillThisEmptyCup → u/Cherimbba]

I would support that too, as a current vegan, who helped process over a thousand deer for lazy (or maybe grossed out) suburban/city hunters growing up, as well as general trapping and fishing for my own family back in the day.

But he'd have to hunt and process it. No apex hunter gets his meat finished at the supermarket.

Anything else is just LARPing at best. Not impressed by Apex hunters using green bait as a drive-thru.

[u/_Sinann → u/FillThisEmptyCup]

Don't you know you see all the absolutely deadly alphas of our species in the Walmart meat aisle? 😂

[u/Cherimbba → u/FillThisEmptyCup]

Yeah he’s 5, we don’t really have hunters or hunting here in Scotland, just farmers, which he does want to be (or a super hero haha). We do have deer hunters, but they have to cull as deer are responsible for a lot of deforestation in the highlands. There are plans to reintroduce wolves as natural predators for them so I’m not sure how much longer “hunters” will be needed either.