I didn't eat meat until I was a teenager. I wasn't a vegetarian so much as I just like a bland diet most of the time. We're talking peanut butter sandwiches and cereal was a lot of my diet as a kid. I didn't like the taste of meat. There was also some child abuse issues both at home and at school. Let's just say refusal to eat it wasn't acceptable. I am now a very picky eater who distrusts anything that tastes even the least bit "off" because I fear tampering. I ate my first hamburger at age 18. I eat beef primarily, though I also like tuna salad and fried shrimp. That's really about the only meat I eat. Sometimes, once in a blue moon, I'll have some bacon, but I'm not that into pork products. Right now I can't eat the beef brisket I just bought 'cause I think my antibiotics are messing with my sense of taste. That sucks. I wonder sometimes if I have some anemia issues because I'll crave meat (especially beef). For me, eating meat on my own terms is a personal victory over a traumatic past. Everyone else can have their own reasons for eating something or not, but now that I eat it I'm not going to stop until I feel like it.