Laming isn't lame.

I've only been playing for about a month, (elo around 500 atm, but slowly climbing the past few days) so my opinions are by no means seasoned or anything. But what is up with all the salt when I lame someone's boars or sheep? This is war, isn't it? What's wrong with taking any advantage you can get? If you leave yourself in a position to lose some early food, why shouldn't I snag it? A few days ago I was in a match and my enemy killed all of my sheep right under my town center. Definitely my fault for not garrisoning my vills and killing his scout. I thought it was hilarious. Same dude then proceeded to Persian douche me, and I had so much fun with that game trying to figure out how to recover.

I did the same thing to someone just now - tried stealing a couple of their sheep, and when their vill grabbed them back, I killed one of the sheep, and the dude went off the rails. Spammed the "boo" taunt for awhile, then called me a dog. Resigned soon after. Got matched with me on the next game and resigned as soon as they realized. As far as I'm concerned, getting under their skin gives me an advantage, and I don't get why so many people seem to think this isn't a valid strategy.

Should there be a game mode that begins with a five minute cease-fire? Should I feel guilty for taking any opportunity I can find?

Like I said, I'm a new player, and not super familiar with the community. For the most part, it seems to be an incredibly supportive and helpful group, so I'm just wondering why "laming" someone's boars or sheep gets people so worked up. The meta in this game is so firmly ingrained that I love watching matches when someone does something different, tries something new that their opponent isn't expecting. There is so much to think about and react to that - particularly at the lower elo - just one thing not going as planned can throw off their entire game, and I really don't see why that itself isn't more of the meta.