Why do vultures make even a man's man (an automobile mechanic) ask, "What are you looking at?" and shudder.

A vulture isn't good or bad: it just is what it is. 

Yes, they might not be beautiful according to a human aesthetic, but what they do is beautiful.  They clean up after death, consuming what has been consumed by disease or accident or killing.  What could be more beautiful than the cleaning of the carcass, put to good use in feeding another creature which, when dead, will be cleaned and consumed by another?

Children and dewy-eyed adults (I count myself among that number) wax poetic about The Lion King and "The Circle of Life."  Isn't the vulture part of that circle?

At this time of year when large flocks of them roost around here, I rejoice when I see them circling and soaring.