I like to think that we live in a society where, as a whole, we are more tolerant than we were 50 or 100 years ago. Discriminating against people because of their race or gender is unacceptable, diversity is celebrated, and the idea of criticising somebody because of their religious beliefs is abhorrent to most of us.

Yet, over the past two weeks, I, and many of my friends and colleagues in the dairy industry, have been called rapists, murderers, liars and fakes. Total strangers have sent messages containing the most offensive swear words in the English language – and then been surprised when we don’t want to have a conversation about dairy farming with them. Just yesterday, somebody laughed about my breast cancer history – another said it was karma for eating meat and dairy products.

I would never wish cancer on anybody – the day that I was diagnosed was the worst of my life. I find it utterly abhorrent that some activists are using words like “rape” and “holocaust” to try and denigrate dairy and meat production. Trying to compare food production with these horrible crimes both dismisses and demeans the emotional and physical pain suffered by millions of people.

We should not criticise anybody’s choice of food, diet or lifestyle – it’s wonderful that we all are free to make the choices that suit our beliefs and philosophies. If you don’t eat or enjoy dairy – that’s entirely your choice and it’s great that you have alternative foods that certainly weren’t around when I was a vegan 25 years ago!

Tomorrow marks the start of #Februdairy – 28 days of positive social media posts celebrating everything to do with dairy. I shall post more details tomorrow, but please, if you enjoy dairy foods, think about posting something to celebrate our dairy farmers, the cows (plus goats and sheep!) that provide us with dairy products, and that fact that we have so many delicious milks, cheeses, yogurts, butters and ice-creams to enjoy.