Cecil and Simba

I watched with disgust the story about the rich dentist luring Cecil out of his protected habitat so that he could kill, skin and behead the beloved lion.  I am not a hunter, but it’s not because I have any moral objection to killing animals.   But this one did kind of hit a nerve with me.   Is it because Disney did such an amazing  job of capturing our hearts as the young Simba grew into the proud warrior in The Lion King?  Perhaps.  

I found this post by Caryn Rivadeneira which did a good job exploring why the uproar over Cecil’s death was so loud.  If you don’t have time to read the whole article, I will sum it  up here.   There were two main reactions to the lion’s death in social media: 1) the dentist is a villain and 2) why is everyone so worked up about a lion dying when people are dying senselessly around the world every day?   The uproar is not over a dead lion.    The uproar is over the man that killed the lion and the method he used.  If the dentist had killed Cecil attempting to save the life of a small child, he would be a hero, not a villain, but Cecil would still be dead.  The dentist is a coward, and cowardice is a trait that people universally agree is deplorable.  So why do we choose to talk about a lion’s death instead of people’s death?  Why do we have to choose?   Why not use the momentum created by this story to try to learn more about ourselves and how we should treat others?