When the very concept of self-interest becomes immoral, there is nowhere left to go but oblivion. -Ed.
Speciesism is the assigning of different values or rights to beings on the basis of their species membership. The term was created by British psychologist Richard D. Ryder in 1973 to denote a prejudice against non-humans based on physical differences that are given moral value.[1 “I use the word ‘speciesism’,” he wrote in 1975, “to describe the widespread discrimination that is practised by man against other species … Speciesism is racism, and both overlook or underestimate the similarities between the discriminator and those discriminated against.”[2The term is mostly used by animal rights advocates, who argue that it is irrational or morally wrong to regard sentient beings as objects or property. Philosopher Tom Regan argues that all animals have inherent rights and that we cannot assign them a lesser value because of a perceived lack of rationality, while assigning a higher value to infants and the mentally impaired solely on the grounds of being members of a specific species. Others argue that this valuation of a human infant, a human fetus, or a mentally impaired person is justified, not because the fetus is a fully rational human person from conception, nor because the mentally impaired are rational to the same degree as other human beings; but because the teleological and genetic orientation of any human being from conception is to develop into a rational human being and not any other creature, and because all humans have an implicit origination from two genetically human beings, and hence, both a primary genetic orientation and primary origination as the reproduction of other human beings, even if in a not fully developed state or if partially impaired.[3 In this view, anyone who is born of human parents has the rights of human persons from conception, because the natural process of reproduction has already been initiated in biologically human organisms. Peter Singer’s philosophical arguments against speciesism are based on the principle of equal consideration of interests. Some philosophers and scientists argue that speciesism is an acceptable position as a form of human supremacy.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Speciesism