10月，美国辛辛那提地区法院一位法官裁定，哥伦比亚大毒枭巴勃罗·埃斯科瓦尔1993年被击毙后留下来的“可卡因河马”及其后代，可以被认为是在美国拥有合法权利的人或利害关系人（interested persons）。 不过一位法律专家随即指出，这项裁定在这些河马居住的哥伦比亚没有任何影响力；也有网友评论说，那就让它们移民美国好了。
Colombian drug lord Escobar is full of evil, killing more than 6,000 government officials, military police and civilians, controlling more than 80% of the smuggled cocaine in the United States in its heyday, with more than $30 billion in assets, and was ranked seventh by Forbes in the 1989 list of the world's richest people. Escobar built a huge zoo, bought a lot of animals, after he was killed, the other animals were properly housed, only one male, three females and four hippos were too big to catch and transport, so they stayed in the Magdalena River Valley in the city of Medellín, which has now grown to about 80 to 100 heads, becoming a local invasive species, known as the "cocaine hippopotamus".
As the number of hippos has grown and poses a serious threat to local ecosystems and biodiversity, some people and scientists have called for their killing, but local farmers disagree because they bring them a huge tourism income; animal conservationists have also flocked to organize a large number of protests. The Colombian government eventually decided to sterilize hippos, having already risked castrating 11 of them through traditional methods, which veterinarians said were terrified; recently received a donation from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to sterilize 24 of them with a simpler drug, and injecting drugs into the body with darts can make them never become moms and mothers.
为阻止哥伦比亚对可卡因河马“惨无人道”的绝育行动，一家动物法律辩护基金会的律师要求美国辛辛那提地区法院授予这些河马“利害关系人”地位，以阻止俄亥俄州两名从事绝育的野生动物专家提供支持。 该律师声称，一项联邦法规允许任何在外国诉讼中有“利害关系人”的人，可以请求联邦法院允许他们在美国作证。 由于河马的倡导者可以提起诉讼保护他们在哥伦比亚的利益，所以根据美国法律，河马应该被视为“利害关系人”。
辛辛那提联邦治安法官卡伦·利特科维茨（Karen Litkovitz）在10月份批准了这一请求。 动物法律辩护基金会认为，这是美国首次宣布动物为“人”，是长期以来寻求撼动美国司法体系授予动物人格地位努力的里程碑式胜利。 该会首席律师克里斯托弗·贝里（Christopher Berry）称这项裁决虽然效力有限但意义深远，是在法庭上主张动物利益更大运动的一部分，他们并不是要求制定新法律，而只是要求动物有能力行使已经赋予它们的权利。
But Camilo Burbano Cifuentes, a professor of criminal law at the University of Exeterado in Colombia, poured cold water on them, arguing that the ruling had no influence on Colombia because it could only function on the U.S. territory itself, and the fate of these hippos would ultimately be decided by the Colombian authorities, not the U.S. authorities.
This may indeed be the first example of the personality of an animal in a U.S. court, where two previous lawsuits for the granting of humanity to elephants for the same rights as humans have been dismissed by the courts, and zoos and gun associations are rejoicing, as these two are the hardest hit areas of animal rights violations. But imagine what the world would be like if all kinds of animals were given the same rights as humans. Animals may not be able to enjoy the corresponding rights, after all, they do not have such awareness, but many people may take the opportunity to get rich, so that various animal-related farmers and companies will lose their homes.
The so-called animal rights are not only to fight for the right to be treated more mercifully for animals, but also to advocate that animals should enjoy basic spiritual rights, especially the right to be free from torture like human beings, that is, animals should be treated as human beings on an equal footing, not just as human property or tools, whether at the legal or spiritual level.
随着人类文明的不断进步，动物保护已经受到越来越多人的重视，一些国家已开始立法保障动物权利；1978年，联合国教科文组织通过了《世界动物权宣言》，认为动物享有生存权，以及受尊重免受虐待的权利。
1992年，瑞士在法律上确认动物为“生命”（beings），而不是“物品”（things）；2002年，德国将动物保护条款写入宪法。 澳洲学者彼得·辛格则走得更远，正在争取美国政府通过《泛人猿宣言》，呼吁将与人类血缘关系最近的大猩猩、猩猩以及黑猩猩、倭黑猩猩组成“平等群落”，各国应让它们享有三项基本权利：生存权、个体自由权和免受折磨权。
Britain also prescribed five freedoms for animals: freedom from hunger and thirst, freedom from suffering due to circumstances, freedom from pain or illness, freedom from expressing nature, and freedom from fear and uneasiness.
However, just as anything is likely to go to extremes, animal rights protection can sometimes cause great damage to human society and even become ecological terrorism. Examples include boycotts against meat, milk, egg and other production enterprises, farms and intensive agriculture; boycotts against companies that use animal raw materials, such as fur, cosmetics, pharmaceutical companies and animal experiments; interception of the transportation of slaughtered animals, and vegans' incessant persuasion to let people eat less meat.
Korean animal rights activists rescue dogs on the market
Most frighteningly, ecological terrorists are directly involved in the "battle" to save animals, such as "rescuing" animals from transport vehicles, laboratories, farms or slaughterhouses, destroying public and private property, and even triggering violent conflicts. Some countries have strengthened legislative regulation of these acts, such as the United States, which has introduced a federal law, the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act, which prohibits anyone from engaging in certain acts that are "harmful or interfering with animal businesses." "The law specifically targets so-called animal rights activists, giving the Justice Department greater powers.
So what rights animals should enjoy, what humans should do, what should not be done, this is a question worth discussing and pondering. Just like these cocaine hippos in Colombia, in just twenty or thirty years, from 4 to nearly a hundred, if allowed to reproduce, it is bound to cause great pressure and damage to other species in the region, and even spread to a wider area, like the wild boars and deer in the United States, Kangaroos and rabbits in Australia, etc., which will cause great damage to crops and pastures every year, and will also cause a large number of traffic accidents, resulting in huge losses of people and property. Shouldn't humanity withdraw from these places and cede living space to them?
Animal rights protection, where is the degree, maybe everyone should think about it.