Comments

1
John Bailo may not be the dumbest MF in the world any more.
2
I was told that it's "a teachable moment".

Who didn't know that trophy hunting goes on every day in Africa? Add in rampant poaching, and there won't be any charismatic megafauna left by 2050.

What else does Africa have to sell but Ivory, Rhino Horn, and the thrill of the kill? Oh, right. diamonds and oil.
3
I didn't click on the link for "Texas cheerleader", so I was surprised when I got further down and it said "she". I thought "Texas cheerleader" was another name for Dubya. It wouldn't have surprised me in the least if he;d been included with Trump Jr in a list of "assholes who hunt animals for no good reason".
4

It's been 50 years since the last colony in Africa.

Yet it seems that the West, and America specifically, are blamed or requested for help when Africa (the continent made up of many diverse nations) has a problem.

Take the Boko Harum girls of Nigeria. NIgeria is an oil rich nation. There are several billionaires there. There is, I imagine, a police force and maybe an FBI type police. Yet at no time did the media call up African leadership to solve the problem. It was always what We (America) were going to do about it.

Tell me why this is. Tell me why hundreds of chimps, rhinos, elephants are killed with impunity, but in this one instance of a legal hunt, there is sudden outrage.

African nations can and must manage themselves. For all our sakes.
5
Maybe it's because we all saw the Lion King as kids. Mufasaaaaaaaaa!

On the bright side, soon all the wildlife will be dead and there will be nothing to poach (except humans?).
6
I'd just say that awareness of hunting these endangered animals has grown. If asked five years ago I would have said that hunting lions was illegal and the idea of sanctioned sporting hunts of lions were things of the past.
A few years ago I vaguely remember learning these types of big game hunts were still a thing when a story went viral, although the Texas cheerleader is the first story to focus on a particular person rather than the existence of the hunts.
In my opinion, Cecil's killing by an American dentist is getting attention because:
a) Enough people are aware that sanctioned lion killing exists so the reaction is not surprise but rather "not again"
b) The reality of (a) means we the story shifts to focusing on the person doing the killing (i.e. the dentist)
c) And (b) means we are now prepared to be outraged at anyone doing this, more so by the fact that this killing was done by one of our countrymen, leaving us with a feeling of culpability. That begs the question "what can be done" to ensure (or reduce the likelihood) that this does not happen again.
7
@4: because Hydrogen?

8
Charles, your class analysis really strikes true here.
9
I have a cat named Cecil. Fuck this guy.
10
Why indeed?

What's going on seems to be a crossover of channels. African tourism has multiple experiences. Liberals get to go to game parks and go on drives where they might get a photo of a big cat. Rich blowhards go to kill a lion. All was fine as long as the two narratives never crossed. It's like a pie store next to a porn store. Everything is fine for 20 years, and then one day somebody walks into the pie store and starts masturbating.

Personally, I think the act of shooting a big cat is vile. But I'm baffled by the very personal outrage against this one douchebag. How about a bit of outrage for the people running farms where lions are raised specifically to be hunted? How about outrage against the Chinese gang leaders who fund poaching operations?

Mr. Mudede, this might be a movie that you could write about. It is about the lion-hunting operations in South Africa. It's called "Blood Lions". Just released and making waves over there... maybe you could bring it to America: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqSUsrPw…
11
People were upset about the other items you mentioned as well. It was just that it went away in about 15 seconds when the internet found something else to be impotently outraged about. This one will be the same way.
12
I think the recognition has to do with the fact that the lion was both known and poached. If he hadn't been lured out of the protected area and been a non-famous lion then I'm sure the reaction would be the same to other trophy kills because unlike other trophy kills, people knew about this lion.
13
I think there are several reasons why this has struck a particularly deep nerve (dental pun intended):

1. The evidence seems pretty clear this wasn't a legal hunt. The lion was deliberately lured out of a protected reserve in the dead of night, so that it could be killed outside the boundaries. This fact runs counter to most USAn's (admittedly lopsided) sense of "fair play".

2. Yes, there is more awareness of these sorts of activities going on - not just in Africa - and the outcry is fueled both by the quick and widespread dissemination of such news, along with our new penchant for expressing outrage over just about anything.

3. Sport killing, regardless of who's doing it, has been steadily losing popularity with the general public, and thus those who continue the practice find themselves increasingly becoming social pariahs.

4. Even if Palmer isn't a member of the "American Aristocracy", he nevertheless had the financial means to squander an estimated $50,000 for the "privilege" of participating in this kill, and the sheer waste of what would be for many a good year's income for nothing more than a brief moment of savage triumph and a photo with a dead animal strikes many people as being decidedly on the immoral side of excessive.
14
@10 Your pie/porn store analogy just made my day.
15
There is the fact that the lion was tortured and murdered in the most painful and agonizing way imaginable, and then skinned and beheaded by that fucking psychopath. We should be more than happy to turn him over to Zimbabwe for prosecution, but he's rich and white so nothing will happen.
16
Because it was the last straw.
17
Killing for sport is vile. BUT Cecil already contributed to the gene pool and he was getting on in years- 13 is geriatric for a wild male - and most likely would be killed by other male lions in the next year or so.
18
Ah, but just imagine Mudede's take if the dentist had got hisself in trouble trying to fuck a lion!
19
@10 unless someone is fucking said lions, Charles probably isn't interested.
20
Ah, if there were only a prize for the most tone-deaf, beside-the-point, non sequitur-ish, unasked-for and unnecessary writing on the Internet, I believe this post would win hands-down.

Hey, though, sounds like Charles Mudede and Walter Palmer would be fast buds. I'd be curious what they'd do in the company of horses though.

For a more thoughtful response to this tragedy (or to be more precise, for a response to this tragedy that actually involved some thought), I'd point folks to what Jimmy Kimmel had to say in his monologue last night.
21
@17

He's probably got some grown up offspring, but the ones who are cubs now are likely to be killed by the lion who takes over his pride.
22
http://www.wildcru.org
Oxford University. This lion was one of the animals they've been tracking.
23
Y'all don't remember the dogs in the air conditioned bus being rescued from Katrina?

We've always cherished pets - even hypothetical pets, like this lion - more than black folks in this country.
25
This is a stupid argument for nothing coherent. People are upset because the world is under increasing pressure and wild animals like lions are symbolic of the things that we are going to lose. So, people with at least 3/4 brain find it offensive that a-holes still revel in glory killings. The people who react against this kind of idiocy also fight against police brutality and international violence. It's fine to make an antagonistic argument for the point: this thing is cute so we care about it more than things that aren't, like people. Isn't the mentality the same? The same actors? Isn't that the point? Why would you distract the conversation or divide the agenda? Can't we just start a 'stop the assholes' campaign and agree that it's all the same cloth?
27
I was pretty outraged, and I didn't even know the douchtard was a dentist. So that element of the story made no difference to me. I will confess that the fact that it was a famous named lion lured out of a sanctuary were the parts of the story that elevated my outrage more than previous poacher stories. That probably shouldn't make a difference, but it adds a more emotional element to me.

Focusing attention on the douchtard dentist is actually a bit of a distraction. The real crime isn't this one particular asshole. The real crime is the entire promotion and practice of killing big animals for sport and ivory. That shit needs to stop.
28
Fetish @23, way to view the world through the prism of your particular grievances.
29
I know another dentist that does this. I'm telling ya- while it might not be every one of them - there is something that can easily go dark and twisted inside the soul of someone that decides they want to make their living by looking and rooting around inside people's mouths.
30
Because of what he does for work? Really? Terrible angle. Terrible article.
31
@29: my dentist is a huge fan of Fox News. They definitely have the potential to be assholes.
32
shooting a large older mature lion within a mile of a National Game Park and he didn't think something was up? Give me a break - this guy is a professed BIG GAME HUNTER who has "bagged" every large mammal there is... there is no 'deniability' available this guy.
33
@10...nailed it. I'm going to get some pie. Seriously. Some pie.
35
"[Y]ou disgusting coward" is the "purest stream of hate" you've ever see on Twitter? What're you, new?
36
Gee, let's not talk about a shifting zeitgeist. That would take some actual work and imagination. No, let's just look at a few surface incidents in the past and throw out some cheap conclusions. There are deadlines, after all. And intelligence is measured by how quickly you come up with ideas, not about the quality of the ideas themselves.
37
I REALLY didn't need another reason to despise dentists and gun-crazed sports hunters than I already do, now. And yet, if Cecil had been a human, it would be murder.
39
#10 got it right.

Charles, a lot of people love Rhodes.

No mention of how screwed-up Zimbabwe is as a nation, its failed policies, and its vile leader Robert Mugabe, and how these things lead to widespread corruption that in turns lead to these types of tragic stories. ZA is now spiraling down the drain.

Africans are selling the world's greatest wildlife out to fund their ongoing blood feuds, simple as that. They have to show that they can lead a nation.
40
@39, actually Zimbabwe went down the drain a long time ago, and is now coming back. There is cautious hope for the future. I was there last year and was pleasantly surprised.

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