Furious mum claims vegan activists intimidated young daughter near meat fridges in supermarket
A furious mother has slammed vegan activists who descended upon her in a supermarket meat aisle 'intimidating and filming' her daughter, demanding the pair avoid animal products.
UK mum, Louise Kirby, was doing her usual shop in Sainsbury's last week when she was confronted by 12 vegan activists.
The group were waving placards while silently standing in front of the meat fridges.
Louise's nine-year-old daughter Sophie was so frightened by them she suddenly declared she was vegetarian.
When the group were escorted from the store just after 3pm, one activist chillingly turned and declared "we're only here to save the babies and children" while pointing at Louise's children.
"It was really surreal,” mum-of-four Louise, 38, said.
"I had my head in the shelves and told her about some of the bargains they had when she suddenly said 'I'm vegetarian, I don't eat anything here*.
"I laughed and said 'don't be silly, since when?".
"I looked up and at that point I felt the atmosphere change – you could cut it with a knife – it was really scary."
The group were dressed in regular clothes and silently held placards with animals and slogans plastered across them.
Office manager Louise said: "I'm a carnivore, that's my choice, if my children wanted to be vegetarian I would support them as it's their choice.
"But it's wrong for people to try and force beliefs on to me and my children – they upset my two-year-old daughter Elsie and scared Sophie so much that she randomly shouted she was vegetarian."
Louise felt so uncomfortable by their silent protest she asked a store guard to move the group on.
"I told them not to bring my children into their protest as they have nothing to do with this. It's out of order."
"It upset my girls and they shouldn't make her feel like that."
A Bolton Chicken Save spokesman said: "Our aim is to promote veganism peacefully.
"As former non-vegans we believe people deserve to know the truth.
"We are sorry the lady felt we were there to intimidate her, we can assure her that was not our intention, we were just trying to raise awareness."
A Sainsbury's spokesman said: "This was clearly a distressing experience and we're grateful to our colleagues who stepped in to help."