Ok, I am going to be devils advocate here but I thought that it was not just for the suffering aspect. For example. Vegan's don't drink milk. Well What is wrong if a Vegan had their own cow and milked it? The cow isn't suffering because they are caring for it. It isn't standing in some processing plant hooked up to hoses and such. It's just a happy cow on a farm and it gets milked once in a while. If it has a calf, you only take a bit of milk so the calf won't go without. I don't see anything suffering, yet it is still against "standard" vegan practices.
It's still the idea that you're manipulating that cow. Manipulating cows is bad. Manipulating penises is good.
Cows, like all mammals, have to be calved in order to create milk. The calf is then either slaughtered for veal or raised on special formula, so there is a certain logic there.
I never knew that Hippy-culture would make me encounter so much Veggie-bull shit.. Vegetarianism is no different than any other "religion".. to each his/her own. Cannibals think that what they believe is perfect. Head-Hunter tribes believe that the body of the "given" is blessed & that body is to be consecrated to the afterlife... who am I as an atheist, no less male, to question that bare breasted, loin clothed women, who take all males to procreate is "wrong"? my point... veggies have their own forums.. seek out "your own kind" and ask them instead of wasting bandwidth because you happen to smoke/toke/are (obviously not-so) enlightened... simple really... this isn't a Veggie site... avoid the conflict... there are hunters here... lol
actually, there is a vegan/vegetarian section, and I happen to moderate it. For the OP and others who care to learn, veganism, is at its heart, a philosophy that animals have inherent rights that contradict use for eating and use. given that, I'm assuming (hoping) the OP is asking on behalf of humans, on the giving and receiving end. That nullifies the question, as the vegan philosophy relates to what humans call lesser animals. I know plenty of vegans who swallow, of all genders/orientations.