One animal, a natural King, beautiful, reverent, noble, free. A father to beautiful cubs, a mate to a wonderful she-cat. Loved by millions, photographed and protected by many. Killing only enough to feed his family, wasting none. Leaving the rest of the world alone. Big Teeth!

The other. A dentist. A weak, pink specimen. Human. Not strong, easily killed by a lion if stupid enough to walk into his domain. Taken to using cowardly weaponry to destroy the other creatures on this planet for (excuses) food, protection, tradition, conservation, fur, skin, pest removal, fear, land seizure and ‘for sport’. Likes to take lions and imprison them in zoos for amusement, also likes to control them with whips to force them into acting foolishly for audiences across the world. Small teeth, but a bigger global bite!

Killing an animal is pretty horrendous in itself, taking a beautiful living creature, a sentient being and snuffing its life out in torturous ways for both pleasure and greed. Let’s face it, millions; billions of animals die every week just to put flesh on our plates without a thought or care to the fear and suffering they experience before they die, overheating on transport trucks, being kicked, punched and beaten at abattoirs, often skinned alive for fur, the adrenaline pulsing through their veins as they watch the one in front die. Whales driven onto beaches so that a rod can be plunged into their spine, so that they drown in their own blood, for humans to have ‘the right to this tradition’. Little kids sitting down to dinner, seeing just a piece of pink food mislabeled as ‘beef’ or ‘pork’ without the real understanding of where this came from…

Has it taken the death of this incredible lion just to simply HIT HOME about how humans are destroying this planet so very, very quickly. Just since 1970, we have lost half of the world’s wildlife and 40% of its sea life. Is this just me, or should everyone be starting to feel VERY WORRIED? Experts are warning that we are well on our way to the planets 6th mass extinction and that most resources will run out by the end of this century….so why are we not doing something about this?

While countries like the USA worry about how to tackle its obesity by building larger airplane seats and how to increase its nuclear arsenal, the world is dying….Somehow none of the above seems relevant if our world is destroyed. People do like to conveniently live in the ‘now’.

The last few days has been mad with the revelations of the death of Cecil, the majestic Lion of Zimbabwe. Everyone has heard about this, it has gone global.

Lions are poached and hunted all the time, but none have reached the news like this one particular lion. Why? Because the man who killed him made a fatal error. He broke one of the hunting laws while killing him. He worked with a team who actively lured this incredible animal out of a protected game reserve, radio collar and all and shot him in cold blood from behind a cowardly blind with a bow and arrow. Not only did the dentist have to hide behind a blind to kill him…..as all cowards would so choose to, (otherwise they might be eaten first) he also chose to use a nasty form of weaponry just so he could have a silent shot. Arrows can maim seriously without death. Also like many rich trophy hunters, he was not a good shot, causing this poor animal to skulk off into the bush, bleeding and wounded for over 40 hours before he could be tracked and shot dead. Fair hunt? Doesn’t sound like a fair hunt to me? Also, the only illegal part of this all was the luring out of the game reserve and shooting the lion in an area where lions were not licensed for killing. All the rest, totally ‘legal’ despite the whole corrupt sound of it all.

It has been claimed that the radio collar, Cecil was fitted with by WildCru, The Wildlife Conservation Research Unit at Oxford University, was hastily disposed off by the hunters, an immediate show of guilt and knowledge that the world would not be happy. (Still legal to shoot a lion with radio collar however).  WildCru had been working intensively with Cecil for many years now as part of a study. Cecil was much loved and admired by all who saw him. He had successfully bred a litter this year, which now, I am told will be killed, if not already, by his male competitor who had an eye on his female. Male lions will not raise another lions genetic cubs and will swiftly remove them so the female will come back into season and can be mated.

Also, Cecil’s skin and head were apparently rapidly removed and his carcass dumped, perhaps, so the lion was less likely to be identified after the team realised the implications of their crime.

It is good to know that the EU are trying to track down and disallow Cecil’s trophy skin and head to enter the EU for transportation back to the USA, but they perhaps will not be able to stop this unless all lion trophies are stopped from being transported.

It is also, secretly delightful to me, to know that Walter Palmer the dentist has had to shut down his dental practice due to the worldwide outrage which his actions have spurned. Despite his pleas that he had no idea that he had killed a much loved lion in an area where he wasn’t allowed to, this does not excuse the fact that he is a renowned trophy hunter on a large scale who has killed countless animals over the last few years. I am puzzled to the enjoyment someone would get out of snuffing the life force out of a magnificent creature. To destroy something who is so beautiful and wonderful while living. To transform it into a lifeless trophy, which will degrade over time anyway. Do you think that hunters get pleasure in knowing that they are contributing to the extinction of the planet’s animals?

Perhaps every person who pays this dentist hunter to treat their teeth were to step back and realise that their money was BLOOD MONEY, they might take their business elsewhere. It cost Walter Palmer $50,000 to shoot Cecil and probably potentially a heck of a lot more to stuff and mount him. What for? So Walter Palmer can hang this once noble and beautiful living creature off his nasty whitewash dental walls for all to see ‘what a big strong man he is’ or perhaps to put in his man cave while he sits smoking a big cigar and feeling all ‘masculine’.

Most women that I know shudder with disgust at the thought of a man killing an animal in cold blood. It is most certainly not an aphrodisiac. It is a sign that the person is obviously very unsure of themselves and needs to prove his manliness or perhaps has some underlying psychopathic tendencies which need releasing. Here is a lovely gallery of some of Walter’s previous ‘conquests’. Wow what a brave man!

At least thousands of years ago, the hunt was evenly matched, as man would stalk animals on foot with a sharpened stick and often he would end up being eaten instead. The population back then was a good balance for the world and a healthy one.

Now we protect our 7 billion human population with laws that stop the mindless killing and murder of human beings (bar third world countries). We have healthcare that stops millions from dying. We have found a way of stopping Aids and very soon, cancer, I am sure. What are we going to do when we can’t stop humans from dying at all? What happens when all the food, land and resources run dry? Just look at Easter Island…..

Perhaps its time the world leaders actually sit back and address the seriousness of the Cecil situation, because at the end of the day, these are the people who can stop all of this from happening. From UK leaders who think its fine to uphold an old and dead tradition of killing foxes to Scandinavian leaders who support the mindless murder of pods of whales who are often secretly dumped uneaten in the ocean. From USA leaders who think its OK to destroy half of the rain-forest, so they can grow ‘burgers’ to world leaders who would rather spill every last bit of oil into the ocean in a fight to get to the last bit of greasy energy.  Also lets not forget the leaders who think that ‘just one more runway’ at our airports wont hurt, considering China is building so many right now.

Perhaps now, we can finally tackle the disgusting Canned Hunting Industry where thousands of lion cubs are bred annually to be shot by tourists who pay to kill them after they have been tamed and raised alongside humans, so they sickeningly trust them. One of the planet’s most despicable and hugely profitable trades. Again, most hunters are amateurs and only ‘wound’ the cats, leaving resident hunters to dispatch the poor creatures. Perhaps if the USA and other countries created laws to prosecute its citizens for international hunting crimes, with as much emphasis on them, as prosecuting citizens for leaving their countries to join ISIS, we might just have a chance of getting this under control.

The world is hurting bad and what’s worse; a vast majority of the world’s population do not want this anymore. The ‘small’ people, the citizens are starting to make their voices heard, but in order to save our green and beautiful planet before it’s too late, the leaders have to stop, sit up and take notice. They need to stop thinking about the fact that they will be dead in forty years time and think about the world they will be leaving their grandchildren.

So Cecil, I pray your death has not been in vain. I pray that this dentist’s mistake will help the world finally sit up and take action. I also hope that Walter Palmer will not be the last hunter to be ridiculed on social media. I pray that the only way to stop this isn’t only when the human race kills both itself and the planet.

Here is a lovely collection of some other brave and noble hunters who obviously by the smiles on their faces are living in a one-man or as you can see below ‘one-woman’ world of delusion.

Anneka Svenska.
Naturalist & TV Presenter.