If it were only that, but traditionally 3rd party candidates are all the rage 2 weeks before the US elections, and then the day after the elections they’re gone from the discourse, and you’ll hear nothing about them for the next 4 years.

Exactly my experience. I often heard stories of vegans being like that, but I never ever saw it so I thought it was just made up to belittle vegans.

Then I joined lemmy and found out that I’m apparently in favour of massacres, slavery and rape because I consume meat/milk/eggs from time to time.

I imagine the vast majority of vegans just go about their lives and resprectfully discuss the ethics of animal consumption when the topic comes up, but these loud militant members really make vegans look bad and they sure as hell make it so that even less people consider going vegan