Everybody knows real men don’t eat meat

Hegans are not wan-faced wimps, but strapping tough nuts

Renouncing flesh eating has not had a good press in the past few days. It was reported that the word “vegan” has associations so cult-like that restaurants are ditching it in favour of the more anodyne “plantbased”, while emotions are running so high in northern France that a vegan festival has been banned “to guarantee public safety”.

Meanwhile, we learn that male vegetarians are subject to so much peer pressure that many order meat when out and about to avoid social ostracism, according to a study from the University of Southampton. The balls required by chaps who do publicly shun the bloody stuff has led to them being dubbed “hegans” – he-men-cum-vegans. The researchers, who will present the findings of their year-long project at the Royal Geographical Society’s Annual International Conference this week, found that “hegans” were not wanfaced wimps, but strapping tough nuts in order to put up with all the flak.

The idea that men “need” meat – a notion at odds with how out of fashion it is these days to be anything but a diehard vegan – goes back to the Book of Leviticus, where we read that sacrificial flesh was only cooked for priests and the sons of Aaron.

Americans are even more mad for this than we are; male Yanks consume 57per cent more meat than their womenfolk, who don’t exactly hold back. Think comedy series Parks and Recreation’s Ron Swanson, who – when presented with greenery – responds: “There’s been a mistake. You’ve accidentally given me the food that my food eats.”

On this side of the pond, we also have flesh-chomping form: that stout 18th-century invention John Bull took his name not only from being bullishly strong and stubborn, but his penchant for red meat. “A man needs meat” was a myth still being propounded two centuries on by the less likeable characters in Barbara Pym’s novels, in which curates were plied with chops by spinsters who lived off scraps.

In the Seventies, trade unionists wolfed down beer and sandwiches (ham, presumably, no hummus wraps here). In 1982, a bestselling book told us that real men don’t eat quiche. The Nineties’ return to nose-to-tail eating meant that chaps could vaunt their masculinity by consuming tripe, chitterlings, and other parts where the sun doesn’t exactly shine. And today, there remains a certain type of bloke who is only happy when droning on about his caveman affectations.

The irony in all this, of course, is that to be a truly red-blooded male requires a diet rich in rabbit food, and low in red and processed meat to protect against blocked arteries, in order to boost virility and reduce the risk of impotence. To put it plainly, real men eat chia seeds. Besides, how fragile does your masculinity have to be to be threatened by a carrot?

I’ve been a vegetarian for so long now that I am forced to pretend it’s a more recent affair to make myself sound younger. My decision was nothing to do with fwuffy bunny wabbits and Disney-eyed cows, but for po-faced “macroeconomic reasons” to do with feeding the world rather than feeding cows to feed the rich, an argument few were making in 1986. Back then, my choices were viewed with hostility, and the phrase “Hitler was a vegetarian” summarised the collective response.

So the veritable vegutopia in which we are now living – particularly when compared with Birmingham in the Eighties – is not lost on me. My conversion occurred when the only ready-meal options were space-aged soya chunks. Restaurants did not even boast the ubiquitous vegetarian lasagne. My grandmother was wont to serve me vegetable shepherd’s pie with sausages on top, as if a meatless meal were unfathomable. As for the Highlands, where we took our annual holidays, I regularly spent a fortnight existing on Kendal Mint Cake.

Throughout my three decades of eschewing meat, there has always been male resistance. My brothers used to put meat in my mouth while I slept in the hope that I would consume it. I turned an ex-boyfriend anaemic, with the result being that I now try to force meat upon my beloved. But he is more of a vegetable addict than I am, citing salad as his favourite food, so relaxed in his masculinity is he. And I can assure you that my hegan is the very picture of virility.

Some people adopt vegetarianism as a vaguely ethical eating disorder; I, however, associate it with extreme greed. I eat better and hugely. Plus, it helps us to live longer on a planet that isn’t expiring beneath us. What’s not to like? I’d warrant that, in the long run, we tree-huggers, hegans and shegans alike will have the last laugh – and all over a delicious plate of chilli non-carne.