A lawyer is arguing that a law banning sex with animals does not preclude sex with dead animals (in this case a deer). There’s this slippery slope, you see — if you extend the definition of “animal” past death, he says, pretty soon you’ve outlawed sex with frozen meat. And that’s just intrusive. Legally and to the frozen meat.

Is it sick if I find the whole debate kind of amusing?

Rationally, I suppose, animal necrophilia is a victimless crime. Unlike a human, deer don’t have family members whose rights are violated. A dead Bambi can’t exactly be traumatized. Like animal cruelty, however, this behavior indicates a sociopathic mindset worth legally tempering.

But the question is much more of a legal one — the people of Minnesota have decided all bestiality is worth outlawing, and the issue is whether animal necrophilia is actually sex with an animal. In the story, the lawyer points to a dictionary definition that defines “animals” as “living,” and most other definitions agree.

I would argue, however, that the definitions use “living” to separate animals from inanimate objects. In common parlance, “dead animal” has meaning. You would not call a piece of meat a “dead animal,” even if you realize it’s a part of one. So there’s no slippery slope.

Robert VerBruggen blogs at http://robertsrationale.blogspot.com.