Why Rights?

In response to Andy - full post here

I think the reason for trying to decide on the rights and value of non-human animals is precisely to decide when and to what extent we are allowed to harm the animal.

If a non-human animal has the same value and rights as a human then it would unacceptable to do to an animal what we would not do to a human. If it is only okay to kill humans in self-defense situations (regardless of how harmless the killing is), and if non-human animals have the same rights as humans, then it would only be okay to kill non-human animals in self-defense situations.

The problem with not recognizing their rights and trying to operate on a "respect as much as you (anyone) can" principle is that many people will decide that they don't have any respect for animals. So, unless there are some reasons to which we can point and say, animals have such-an-such rights, the value of animals is subjective. The conclusion can also become sort of slippery slope, unless we fall victim to speciesism.