We are disconnected from the fur trade or the skin trade—we can select these products from the rack or even from a mail order catalog, and they later show up on a doorstep or at the apartment. We are greatly distant from the animal testing that goes on in the run-up to marketing of household products and cosmetics, which are nicely lined up and available to us at department stores bearing no evidence of any pain, suffering, or struggle on the part of an animal. We are certainly very removed from our meat, which comes neatly wrapped and packaged in its proper section at the supermarket, well-prepared at a restaurant, or barely recognizable at a fast food joint.

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg faced up to this reality in announcing recently that he’d no longer eat meat unless he’d killed the animals himself. This of course means, according to him, that he’s reduced his meat consumption substantially. He then proceeded to slaughter some animals with a knife held in his own two hands. He’s presumably eaten these animals.

Many Americans expressed shock at the act and sympathized with the animals he killed. Some condemned Zuckerberg, accusing him of being cruel.
While I understand those natural reactions to the killing of these creatures, I think we owe Zuckerberg some plaudits, not only for reminding people that eating meat involves the killing of animals, but also for recognizing that it’s morally dubious to simply pass the “dirty work” off to an anonymous slaughter plant worker. Indeed, we should ask ourselves if there’s really much of an ethical difference between killing an animal (what Zuckerberg is doing) and paying others to kill animals for us (what most of us do).