Its a shame and stupid but its the reality of it all. People give me sob stories sometimes at the pet store how they have a pet mouse or a pet rat and its horrible that I feed them to my snakes.

My response to them is, "Will it make me a better person in your eye if I let my snake starve to death?" That usually does the trick

I'm sure those same people have no problem eating eggs for breakfast, chicken for lunch, and steak for dinner. But since they never took a walk through a slaughter house they don't much care as long as its nicely packaged at the supermarket!

Simply put when people have irrational fears they come up with irrational thoughts and do irrational things. I wouldn't let it bother you as you'll be dealing with all sorts of stupid comments as a snake keeper.