[voidlogic]

>Killing animals shouldn't be completely abstracted away from society - we need to understand what we are doing in a hands on way.

I agree, but I think its worth pointing out that in many parts of the country (esp. the non-costal areas), much of the population has shot and cleaned a deer, turkey, etc.

So to assume in modern America that this kind of intimacy with death is universally abstracted would be a mistake. After all an estimated 43.7 million Americans hunted last year [1].

1: http://www.conservationforce.org/role4.html

[SoftwareMaven]

I want to second my agreement, but expand it to all aspects of the diet. I think having gardens and chickens (mostly for eggs, but in the pot when no longer producing) would do more for the health and mental well-being of our society than just about anything else we could do. Many kids don't know what kind of fruit/veggie something is without looking at the label. My high school daughter has a friend who just had her first banana; she's never eaten spinach.