I think I just found the logical conclusion to alien life. If you look at the people on earth who seem to be the most open-minded about life and minimizing harm to life, they always draw the line at plants because they are a much different form of life than we are. People use the argument of plants lack of conscious awareness to say that their struggle or pain means nothing. And this is just the difference between plants and animals, two different forms of life here on earth. I think if we ever did find alien life we would both be so incredibly different that we might not even see each other as a valid form of life to be considered