Cut...It...Out!
Yes, I think the name of this special day, Cut Out a Heart Day, is purposely ambiguous.
If you celebrate February 14 with young ones, you probably should cut a heart out of construction paper or something similar. Make it pretty and pink or red. Or make it white and decorate it with shiny things.
Avoid glitter, if possible.
Now if you're going to try something more...what should I say?...crude...gruesome...yucky...like butchering a chicken, then keep the kids at a safe distance.
I'm not saying you have to keep them out of the picture entirely. When we were kids, we watched Grandpa butcher chickens on the farm several times. It was pretty exciting and interesting actually.
Early on, he would let the newly butchered chicken run around like a chicken with its head cut off. After figuring out that this bruised the meat too much, he would put the headless bird inside a concrete cylinder where it couldn't further damage itself.
I'm not sure if those cylinders had any other purpose on the farm.
I'm digressing, but I remember one time Grandma asked if we wanted to help pluck the chickens. We tried a little, but it was too difficult for an inexperienced person to remove all the pin feathers, so we gave up and let her finish the job.
I wonder (just a little) how they butcher chickens today. I'm guessing it's largely automated.