Men Who Don’t Eat Meat Are Seen as Less Masculine by Women

With more men turning vegan for various reasons, meat lovers probably thought they were a dying “breed.” They needn’t worry: a new study shows that men who don’t eat meat are seen as less masculine by women.

As the Daily Mail informs, this even includes women who have eliminated meat out of their diets completely.

The idea, it would seem, is that men who don’t eat meat are regarded as more virtuous, whereas meat lovers are considered more masculine, therefore more attractive.

The study, published in Appetite journal, was conducted on hundreds of young people, men and women, who were given descriptions of fictional people and then asked to rank certain aspects of their personalities.

These fictional characters had all varying diets, with the general tendency being to consider the vegetarians as less masculine because of appearing more virtuous.

Researcher Dr. Steven Heine of the University of British Columbia says the study is hardly surprising since men and meat have always made such a wonderful pair.

“Meat has been closely associated with power and privilege – a staple for gentry and a rare treat for the peasants,” Dr. Heine says, as cited by the aforementioned publication.

“Through abstaining from meat, a widely established symbol of power, status and masculinity, it seems that the vegetarian man is perceived as more principled, but less manly, than his omnivorous counterpart,” he adds.

Of course, that’s not to say that all is lost for vegans: men can breathe easy knowing that not all women dream of this uber-masculine, man-eating man.

On the contrary, actually, there are plenty of them for whom the ideal male partner must have other, better defined traits than masculinity – so, for them, this comes last.

“Some people would prefer a more masculine partner, whereas others prefer a less masculine partner,” study co-author Matthew Ruby says, as cited by the same publication.