Paleoanth,
Moral beliefs that influence the way one lives life can be said to be characteristic of religion. While there is obviously far less organization in the vegetarian community than in real religions, I do think it is appropriate to call vegetarianism a kind of quasi-religion. It is a set of behavioral and moral precedents which is rooted in a subjective moral belief. This belief is, of course, that all sentiment organisms are inherently equal and should be treated as such. Behavioral precedents of the various branches of vegetarianism include respecting animals as spiritually equal sentiment beings which should be free and ideally never under human control, not eating meat, not eating eggs milk, or sometimes not using any animal derived products at all.

As for whether or not vegans/vegetarians are capable of truly respecting the conscious choice omnivores make to view animals as a lower form of life (and therefore eat them), I definitely think vegetarians and vegans are capable of respecting another person's right to choose to believe a moral doctrine different from their own. This is a civil rights issue you are talking about, I never claimed there was something about normal vegetarians that prevented them from respecting others civil rights; rational people regardless of their beliefs respect the civil rights of others (and therefore, the right to adopt whatever beliefs they wish). As I said in my first response, tolerance of someones right to choose, and how you actually feel about the choices they make are two different things. I still stand by the belief that true moral vegetarians/vegans believe that in a perfect world, carnivores would be "awakened" and convert to a "cruelty free" lifestyle. A christian doesn't necessarily not respect the right of someone to choose to be jewish, or vice versa, but I think both would think it ideal if others decided to adopt their faiths and convert.