I’m not sure there’s quite as much stigma as you think. I definitely agree that a lot of people are like “ugh, vegans” on the internet, but in my experience nobody really cares in real life as long as you don’t bother them. You might get a “well I can’t live without my bacon” comment or whatever, but that’s pretty much the extent of it… Especially if you’re flexible and willing to eat vegetarian or eat meat on the occasion that you do go out… Nobody is going to care. Hell, you can just tell them you’re avoiding meat to lower your blood pressure or something. It’s cool!

I’ve been in groups of people with vegans and nobody really cares… in my experience usually the vegans are chill and maybe somebody else pokes a little fun at the vegans, but that’s kind of the extent of it, despite what it sounds like from online discourse. Maybe people in your friend groups talk shit about vegans and you’re scared of that too, and that’s fair, but for the most part I think people just like the easy punching bag and just don't really know anybody in the group they’re talking shit about… and when they do it’s usually just “oh, that guy is fine, actually, wouldn’t have thunk.”

Anyway, I’m not sure if you’re actually interested in changing your diet at all, but I think if you are you shouldn’t let the vegans convince you not to. If it’s something you want to do, do it :). Even if it’s not something you want to do all of the time it can kind of be fun to mix up meals sometimes and sometimes it’s nice to not have so many choices at a restaurant, and you might even discover something you like that you wouldn’t have tried before… At any rate, don’t be so afraid of the vegans, they can’t hurt you, they have low iron :).

I wouldn't want to be associated with vegans, either, tbh. But if someone shows interest or disdain regarding my eating habits, I tell 'em my take. If they like it, cool. If they scorn me, they can fuck right off.

I'm not vegan, and don't really intend to be. But I strongly prefer to eat humanely raised and killed meat. That's pretty uncommon and expensive, so I often just skip meat.

..if someone's interested, I'll tell them about how I kill and eat animals, and why, as well as more about why I avoid most commercial meats.

But yeah, social stigma. If you want to make change, first you've got to sort out your own feelings on that. Really, that's true for any change, not just socially stigmatized ones.

Edit: consider this fun tidbit. Since Veganism is primarily about consent and how an animal can't give it, the only truly vegan meats are vat meats.. ..or other humans (if they consent and aren't under duress).