Nothing is as bad a child abuse when it relates to animals, imo!
I'd agree, but there are people who say that any living thing is worth protecting, those that can't have an informed say in their own destiny only more so.
At the same time there are people that say some of the disabled are 'less' than some animals because they have less capacity for communication, abstraction etc.
It's a difficult place to legislate in, and it's worth remembering that the people making these claims are doing it from the best of intentions: they want to reduce suffering. If the suffering they see in animals is, to them, the equal of the suffering of abused children that doesn't mean they value children any less than anyone else, just that they don't see other animals than human as being any less.
I disagree with them, but at an intellectual level: I understand their motivation.
O.