Gary,
I wish I thought you were not being sarcastic, because if you were being sincere, I would consider yours to be a strongly principled and honorable (if rather impractical) position, comparable to that of a libertarian who refused to use any government services such as roads, parks, or the postal system. Of course I still appreciate your humor about the grape plants. I've heard the arguments about killing fleas and such lots of times, but "the cruel binding of grape plants to stakes their whole lives" is deliciously refreshing, with a slight hint of aged wood.
Nevertheless, I do not accept the implied argument that because we do not pass laws to keep living beings like worms, fleas, and grape plants from suffering, we ought not to pass any laws designed to keep higher animals from suffering. I believe there is a hierarchy of life, based on the capacity to suffer (or possibly, I now think, on the degree of consciousness, which may amount to roughly the same thing). A human can suffer more than an ape, an ape can suffer more than a cow, a cow can suffer more than a fish, a fish can suffer more than a worm, a worm can suffer more than a plant, a plant can suffer more than a bacteria, etc. This hierarchy may be adjusted as our scientific understanding of the various beings grows, but that is roughly the order of things.
Humans are not separate and apart from nature. We are part of it, and should respect other life forms, even though they do not merit the same rights that we do. In some cases the rights accorded to humans would be meaningless to other animals. But rights that would be important to some animals might be meaningless to others. A chimpanzee might suffer from being confined to a space not much larger than itself and show signs of stress, loneliness, etc., whereas an earthworm might be oblivious to such conditions, provided there were adequate nourishment available. Each species should be accorded the minimum legal protections necessary to keep its members from experiencing extreme suffering, at least at the hands of humans. We cannot at present stop the cycle of violence in nature for other species -- indeed we have not completely stopped it among human beings, although I think we have made significant progress since the time of savages in the jungle. Wolves will still hunt and kill deer. But possessing greater consciousness and understanding imparts on us a greater responsibility not to cause suffering -- a wolf does not possess moral understanding, but we do, therefore it is wrong for humans to kill in the way a wolf would, when there are alternatives available.
I hope that eventually, advances in learning and technology will enable humans to create meaningful protections even for the lives of animals and plants much lower on the evolutionary ladder such as those you mention. In the meantime, we are in a position to alleviate a great deal of suffering on the part of animals like cows, pigs and chickens, and I believe morality requires us to take steps to lessen the harm we as a species inflict on them.
Yours in liberty,
<<< Starchild >>>