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Yeah, Lions have clearly made contracts with deer herds to kill only when they're hungry.

Law is validated by ethical observation, is it not? My argument remains focused on the ethical rather than the political; primarily questioning the ethical foundation of contemporary legal jurisdiction. Human law doesn't prevent human criminality, it simply enacts additional security over that which is objectively recognized as correct and proper interactive behavior. Raising the legal bar to preclude an animal's ethical claim to live is neither relavent nor persuasive according to what is readily observable in natural behavior necessary to survive. That which demonstrates an ability to live by self-reliance ought to be entitled to continue doing so, else what is the meaning of securing a right to life?

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference. -- Robert Frost A popular quote. Power derived from others. He took the road less travelled... Maybe it was the one he really wanted, maybe it wasn't. The point is he emphasised that it was less travelled, by others. A while ago I would have used this to make me feel better about any less popular or common view I held. It's funny because everyone I talk to likes to take the road less travelled. In order to hold a sense of esteem we have to feel superior to others in some vague undefined way. But it's built on a shaky foundation. It requires you to evade so much and miss out on so much good too. With that said, it's not like there is much out there (in terms of resources) to help you built up a solid foundation.

What's the point of this argument? It's total semantics. Animals don't have the ability to conceptualize. Period. If they did, they would have attempted to communicate with us conceptually by now, that has not happened to this date. Only humans so far have shown that they have a conceptual consciousness. Since the concept of 'rights' is again a concept, only humans understand rights. Therefore only humans have rights. Any attempts at proving that animals have a conceptual consciousness is just a bunch of whack job scientists trying to anthropomorphize and degrade humans down to the level of animals.