If you accept utilitarianism you should accept that animals have equal rights to humans

RIGHTSI cannot stress this enough, the "principle of equal consideration of interests" is a term coined by Peter Singer, it is used as an axiom of preference utilitarianism, there is no such thing as "the right of equal consideration" (Singer is also opposed to natural rights).Natural rights are no axioms, natural rights are supported by rights theorists who could use an axiom like "Do whatever is not a violation of the (natural) rights given by this theory".Of course one can proclaim that utilitarianism is a natural right of all sensible organism but at this point we have distorted the terms beyond recognition, we might as well say that obeying the laws of physics is an inalienable natural right of everything. EQUALI never claimed that we should categorize species in terms of intelligence in the sense that more intelligence means more moral importance, all I (or Singer in this case) was saying is that mental capacities can make a difference in moral judgements, which you supported instead of refuting.To hopefully get a little bit clearer on the principle, here is another quote from Singer:"Equal consideration of interests is a minimal principle of equality in the sense that it does not dictate equal treatment"(1)"as outlined at the start of the debate we are debating natural and not legal rights so the right to vote is not an adequate example."Fair enough but utilitarianism does not know either. I am not sure what else I can say at this point other than pressing my original arguments. I can only advice everyone to simply google "Utilitarianism and rights" I guarantee that you will exclusively find articles objecting to utilitarianism because it has no regards for (natural) rights and responses to those objections."There has to be a reason given to extend this principle into the animal realm and you do not give one."I assumed that, since every form of utilitarianism and every utilitarian I know of is in favor of moral considerations for animals, this would be self explanatory but there we go:Since a lot of animals are able to have interests those are covered by the principle of equal consideration of interests. It is as simple as that. "The reasons for this right are grounded in the equal capacity between animals and humans to feel pleasure and pain."I am sure that most animals can feel a pretty similar degree of pain and pleasure to that of humans but my point is still that for example a slap on the back of a horse and a slap on the back of a newborn will result in completely different levels of pain and thus they should not be treated equal."Natural rights are rights which are "natural" in the sense of "not artificial, not man-made", as in rights deriving from deontic logic from human nature, or from the edict of a god. They are universal; that is, they apply to all people, and do not derive from the laws of any specific society. They exist necessarily, inhere in every individual, and can't be taken away. For example, it has been argued that humans have a natural right to life. These are sometimes called moral rights or inalienable rights."(2) It is quite funny to claim that utilitarianism provides inalienable, natural rights since the cliché objection to utilitarianism basically goes like "It is ok for utilitarians to murder an innocent person if the organs can save two others" .....which would violate the right to life. (1)Practical Ethics, p.22(2)http://en.wikipedia.org...