11 thoughts about Cecil the Lion

Including:

8) Some activists (who I respect) associated with completely unrelated causes (which I support) have been complaining about the relative attention that Cecil the lion is receiving, which is not helpful. It’d be super great if everyone could knock off the “lots of people care about a dead lion but I haven’t personally observed them caring about a completely unrelated issue that I personally think is more important” nonsense. People are allowed to care about multiple things. People are allowed to care about different things than you. Threatened species conservation is an important thing. There are also other important things. And no one has ever won anyone over to their side by saying “you’re dumb for caring about the thing you care about, care about the thing I care about instead.”

9) It is possible to be concerned about many aspects of trophy hunting while acknowledging that it can help conservation in some contexts. It is possible to think that what this dentist did to Cecil the lion was bad, but still think that threatening to kill the dentist is bad. It is possible to think that threatening to kill the dentist is bad, but still think that folks saying that “any criticism of hunting is silly and extremist because some critics threatened to kill a dentist” is bad. This is called nuance. More people on the internet should learn about it.