My opinion on animals has really changed over the years. I grew up hunting and not particularly caring about ethical or moral treatment of animals. Having dogs started to really clue me in on the idea that animals have more feeling and intelligence than I ever gave them credit for. Biology classes and naturalist documentaries shifted my opinion even more, and now after getting into the subject and reading up extensively on evolution and primatology, I try not to make a distinction between us and animals anymore. I guess I take a utilitarian view of animals. We are designed to eat both meat and vegetables. Meat is a far more efficient source of calories that make our large energy diet possible. There is no point in denying that we are predatory animals and some are resigned to be our prey. So, I do accept that it is simply the lot in life of some species that they will be food for us. That is what domesticated farm animals have evolved to be. Docile, fast-growing variants of animals. I prefer they are treated well during their life, but realize and accept that they will become food before their natural end. That's how the food chain works, and that's how it has to be. However, I have come to morally oppose the killing of animals for any sort of sport or entertainment, and oppose the destruction of natural wildlife or habitat for trivial reasons. The more intelligent the species affected, the stronger I feel opposed to it. Morals are driven by empathy, and all mammals are hard wired to be empathetic. However, that empathy is limited only to those we can relate to. If you can convince yourself that animals are emotionless automatons driven purely by a genetic code, you likely won't have any empathy towards them. Once you learn enough about them to see how much like us some of them really are, the more empathy for them you will feel.