man after my own heart...

NPR commentator, on a recent pickle-juice-drinking contest:

"The winner drank [blah blah] pints of pickle juice in [blah] minutes... Also a winner: anyone who chose not to compete."

AFAIC, pickles -- and all things pickled -- are the work of satan.

Cucumbers were not intended to be eaten in the first place -- they were made so immature boys can hold them up to their bodies in the supermarket when their mother isn't looking and snicker at each other as they wave them around in a vulgar way.

And vinegar is meant to be a (subtle) flavoring, like say on fish-n-chips. It is not meant to be the primary taste of a food item. Would you eat large sticks of some vegetable that came in a jar of ketchup and no longer tasted like anything but ketchup? I didn't think so.
And BTW, Korea should be part of the Axis of Evil merely for developing Kimchi and threatening others with it.

I know pickling was developed as a way to preserve food so it doesn't spoil, but at some point I think we can say "You know what? We don't have to do this any more. We have refrigerators, more efficient farming methods, plus ships and trucks and planes to bring us food from warm places. We no longer have to eat blood sausage, haggis, goose giblets, the contents of other animals' intestines, or things pickled."

My position is that if pickling is what's necessary to preserve food through the winter, then I'll wait until spring, thank you.

I think I've made my main point.