(26) Practice Article #7: Cecil the lion's plight reinforces the need to kill off safari hunts

Background Information
Following the hunting of a famous lion ‘Cecil’ by an American dentist the issue of whether or not the hunting of animals should be allowed has been discussed. Those who promote the practice of hunting suggest that the practice is tied to tradition and honour, and provides a source of income to many in impoverished nations. Those against the hunting suggest that it is a barbaric practice that threatens our existence as a society and prevents sustainable sources of income from being maintained.

Cecil the lion's plight reinforces the need to kill off safari hunts
August 3, 2015, The Guardian
Today, hunters pay tens of thousands of dollars for permits to shoot lions, leopards and cheetahs, hippos and elephants. Shooting a giraffe costs $US1800 in Namibia, and hunting for impala, springboks, ostriches or wildcats costs only a few hundred dollars. Birds can be shot for free. It is an industry, a "sport" of the wealthy. Some consider it a contest, a challenge of human wits against the animal instinct for survival. The writer and big-noting big-game hunter, Ernest Hemingway, considered this contest a noble exhibition of manliness.
It is, in truth, a grotesque and unjustifiable barbarity, and despite well-meaning efforts to have hunting revenues buttress the conservation industry in Africa, it remains a brutal extravagance, a lop-sided contest of man and animal.
That was exemplified in Zimbabwe last week with the killing by an American dentist of a well-known lion named Cecil. The animal was lured from a national park to private land, where it was shot with a bow and arrow then tracked and shot dead. Not only was this lion being closely monitored by a research team at Oxford University, but it was a source of tourism dollars in its own right, an attraction that aided the nation's economy. Thus, a hunter has terminated one otherwise sustainable source of revenue, a tourist attraction, to pursue his inglorious quest for a hide and a head to hang at home.
Hunting and its related industries are said to be worth more than $US1 billion across southern Africa, generating jobs for local communities. There is an argument, too, that having controlled hunting on huge ranches with their own wildlife herds takes pressure off wild animal populations and alleviates incursions from poachers. As well, revenues obtained from hunting permits are directed to the maintenance of national wildlife parks, which would otherwise be given over to farmers.
Yet this is simply a barbaric practice, less ‘manly’ and more a unforgivable indulgence.’ Nature tourism is a growing industry catering to the innately curious, those with a desire to see the wild, the exotic and the circle of life. For all that, it is impossible to fathom the mindset of someone who believes the circle of life ends with them and that shooting animals for sport or fun is acceptable.
For those who might say they cannot get fired up about a dead lion when there are horrific things happening to people all over the world, we say your perspective may be understandable. But how we treat even the smallest of creatures reflects on our humanity. If we brush off wanton cruelty to animals or the exploitation of animals, then we risk becoming immune to cruelties when they are inflicted on our own.

Thus the protection and uproar at the murder of ‘Cecil’ is not simply outrage at the waste of a lion, but by extension has become a symbol of our desire to protect our environment, our society, our humanity and our future.