For Meyaard-Schaap, the awakening came in high school, when his older brother, Brian, returned from a formative semester abroad in New Zealand with some shocking news for his meat-and-potatoes family: Because of religious and environmental concerns, Brian was going vegetarian. "I literally knew nobody who had ever made that choice," Meyaard-Schaap said of his brother's decision. "In my mind, I created this group of people [vegetarians] who were like weird hippies and throwing red paint on fur coats on the weekends ?" people I felt no connection to or no solidarity with at all."