This whole thing is grade-A dumb. The Obama administration engages in a months long drone campaign in Yemen that illegally murders 100s of people, and inevitably leads to the country's collapse. No hysteria.
Lion gets shot by a dentist, and the world wants to ruin this guy's life with no quarter given. Dumb dumb dumb.
Feel free to start your viral campaign.
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I understand why people hunt. I do but it's not for me. I don't understand this type of hunt (i.e. one involving baiting).
What I also can't understand is why hunters believe posing beside the corpse of their hunt and mounting it on the wall is "honouring" the animal. That I will never get.
Baiting may still be allowed in Alberta, it was permitted during the spring bear hunt, not sure if it still is or not. The pictures are for bragging rights to your buddies, or your "proof". I prefer eating the tasty, tasty deer sausage off of the campfire my way of honoring the animal (I only cut and process it, my brother and nephews are the hunters).
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This whole thing is grade-A dumb. The Obama administration engages in a months long drone campaign in Yemen that illegally murders 100s of people, and inevitably leads to the country's collapse. No hysteria.
Lion gets shot by a dentist, and the world wants to ruin this guy's life with no quarter given. Dumb dumb dumb.
I'd say the difference is that the general public probably feels like they have enough influence to do something about the guy killing the lion, whereas they have very little control over what the U.S. military does.
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Peter12 is just causing distraction from his attire that includes rhino horn cuff-links, giraffe leather vest, lion fur blankets, crocodile shoes, hippo teeth combs and elephant tusk jewellery.
Peter12 is just causing distraction from his attire that includes rhino horn cuff-links, giraffe leather vest, lion fur blankets, crocodile shoes, hippo teeth combs and elephant tusk jewellery.
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Baiting may still be allowed in Alberta, it was permitted during the spring bear hunt, not sure if it still is or not. The pictures are for bragging rights to your buddies, or your "proof". I prefer eating the tasty, tasty deer sausage off of the campfire my way of honoring the animal (I only cut and process it, my brother and nephews are the hunters).
Your last sentence I understand. Hunt, use the animal. No problem with that even if it's not my thing. It's the picture taking and trophy taking that is for, as you say, bragging rights. Nothing to do with honoring or respecting the animal.
We are choosing between the two. Last week a guy kidnapped, raped and murdered an 8 year old in Santa Cruz. The general public is disinterested. Boko Haram executed 10 fishermen by slitting their throats with knives earlier today. How much do you want to bet Cecil continues to get more attention? In general I agree - the fact that other problems exist doesn't mean poaching isn't worthy of attention or condemnation. But like everything else to do with this story, the scale is just completely out of proportion.
It would be equally silly to suggest that the resources put towards wildlife conservation SHOULD be anywhere close to human conservation. Human lives matter more than animal lives, even when we think the animal is cool or cute.
Or just people whose reaction to this is "yeah, that's terrible that happened and the guy seems like a horrible person... but really? All this over a lion?"
I agree that, generally speaking, humans should value a human being's life more than an animals (and indeed we typically do.) However, one circumstance which may be influencing public reaction in this case:
Number of humans alive today: 7 billion
Number of wild lions alive today: 30,000
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I find the numbers game entirely morally unsatisfying in all cases where death is concerned. Whether there are fifty million lions or one, it couldn't possibly make me care more about that life than a human being's.
Similarly, and maybe more poignantly, the number of humans alive doesn't somehow devalue human life. If there were ten billion of us instead of seven, that would not make your life less valuable. People are not a commodity.
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Not saying I support it. Just saying I don't have strongh feeling either way about it.
Yeah this lion thing is bad but wow, the reaction to this is so over the top
Is it?
This is what generates reaction. Numbers don't resonate with people. Seeing the visual reality of something does. Connecting numbers to something real.
The comparison I make is Ray Rice knocking out his partner in the elevator.
We all know domestic abuse happens. We know the figures. We've seen the numbers for a long time.
But when you actually saw the video of it happening in front of your eyes, then for a lot of people that's when it struck home.
I think this is similar.
I think there is a weird trend where anything the public reacts to, there is a subset that says "oh wow that's so over the top".
Why?
This is a disgusting practice. I don't see why we would think it is over the top. Perhaps the reaction to this point has been less than it should have been.
Dentist is facing Zimbabwean calls for his extradition now.
Quote:
In Harare's first official comments since Cecil's killing grabbed world headlines this week, Muchinguri said the Prosecutor General had already started the process to have 55-year-old Walter Palmer extradited from the United States.
Muchinguri, a 91-year-old veteran from President Robert Mugabe's ruling ZANU-PF party, described Cecil - a black-maned lion well-known to foreign tourists in the Hwange National Park - as an "iconic attraction".
"The illegal killing was deliberate," she told a news conference. "We are appealing to the responsible authorities for his extradition to Zimbabwe so that he can be held accountable for his illegal actions."
Also why are people not in as much of an uproar over the death of 5 elephants? That species is in much more dire situation.
Quote:
While the world mourned Cecil, the 13-year-old lion that was allegedly shot by an American hunter in Zimbabwe, an even more devastating poaching incident was quietly carried out in Kenya.
Poachers killed five elephants in Tsavo West National Park on Monday night. The carcasses were recovered by rangers on Tuesday morning — what appeared to be an adult female and her four offspring, their tusks hacked off.
While the killing of the lion in Zimbabwe has attracted the world’s attention, the death of the five elephants has received almost no coverage, even though elephants are under a far greater threat from poachers than lions. Their tusks can be sold in Asia for more than $1,000 per pound.
I like to think that the attention on Cecil will bring more attention to other poaching activities. Just the fact that people are releasing these stories with a "Look at this too!" tone is a step in the right direction.
Agreed. Much easier to be social media mad at an ego stroking American dentist than some local nameless thugs. Just saying, it definitely helped the internet traction to say 'he killed Cecil the Lion' almost humanizing the animal. For the record I think the killings are deplorable.
Also, as I said to peter12 earlier, If people are that concerned about the other endangered species that are being poached, feel free to start your own campaign. I understand where the sentiment comes from, there are a lot of other problems in the world, but nothing is stopping you from speaking out about them in however manner you see fit.
Not saying I support it. Just saying I don't have strong feelings about it either way
Yeah this lion thing is bad but the reaction to this is over the top and absurd
The reaction here I think is on point. You have to remember the whole point of trophy hunting: To be vain and to show everyone what a badass mother####er you are to pick off a helpless animal with no shot to escape. But if that behaviour is treated as abhorrent, and those who do it as social pariahs, they likely will either never post pictures of themselves in this position (as the consequences can be harsh), or stop doing the act. Regardless, the main reason to do this, ego and vanity, has now been limited or eliminated altogether. That's a start to ending this. Obviously goes deeper than just rich guys wanting to kill though.
Is the fact he's a rich American make it easier for this to blow up? More than likely. I think most people though have found the practice revolting for a while, I just think this particular case brought it to another level because social media is more prevalent than ever. If he did this 3 years ago he probably doesn't catch much for it. That info from his past has come out to make him look really bad is also likely driving this hard, this isn't some decent guy who made a mistake. Lest we forget he is a felon, a felony he got from this practice.
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Why worry about the lion when there are billions of people living in hunger and poverty?
You're totally right. Because there are people out there who have unfortunate circumstances that are out of our control, we should just not care or give a crap about this certain situation. Thanks!
