“I believe in the right to bear arms and the right to arm bears.”
– Robin Williams
As you may have seen throughout cable news, the shooting death of Cecil the Lion is kinda of a big deal. But more to the point, it truly is a tragedy that a creature so majestic, so innocent, had to lose its life.
I never considered hunting much of a sport. The late Williams is exactly right with that joke. How is a sport a sport when one side doesn’t suffer any consequences if they screw up? If a hunter misses on a shot, they don’t lose anything. If he or she hits their target, the loser didn’t even have a chance to defend his or herself. It’s not a sport. It’s murder.
All of that said, hunting is a necessity when it comes to controlling animal population. There are families of deer that visit my front and backyard on a daily basis. They’re beautiful creatures. But with every nice sighting, there’s a deer lying on the side of the highway just a mile away. You can’t go very long without seeing another and another. There just isn’t enough food, enough land, so dying at the hands of a hunter’s gun is actually the much more merciful form of death.
Still, it’s hard not to get choked up when hearing about Cecil, as ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel did on his show Tuesday night. Kimmel is a good human being if the off-the-camera stories shared about him on The Howard Stern Show are any indication. He’s certainly no phony. That’s what makes him as popular and so non-polarizing…just a truly genuine, nice guy who mostly stays away from controversy and also happens to be a rare talent. And he sees the life taken of a beautiful animal for no apparent reason in something disguised as sport and gets emotional. Not for “good TV” or to get a few more YouTube clicks, but because Cecil’s death affected him to the point a relatively old pro couldn’t contain himself. If you watch the clip, it’s hard to imagine anyone finding issue with it.
Enter Glenn Beck.
The former Fox host took issue with Kimmel getting emotional. For what…is about as mysterious as the thinking behind his wardrobe selection. Beck used the ridiculous argument that Kimmel should be getting equally as upset over the Planned Parenthood videos as he is over a lion being shot down in cold blood. Sure…let’s play this game all day: Instead of Cecil, shouldn’t we be mourning the dozens shot dead in Chicago (46 last month alone) recently? How about all of the Catholics who are beheaded at the hands of ISIS? Whole villages executed by Boko Haram? Or how about mourning the death of Samuel DuBose by that asinine officer in Cincinnati? Does any of those examples qualify? We’re not allowed to have emotions about what Beck deems as much less significant? How does that make Kimmel “sick” in the mind of Beck?
The Blaze founder is also one to talk about tearing up while the red light is on. He practically made crying on the air a monthly tradition while on at Fox. So please…spare everyone your indignation over Jimmy Kimmel–who doesn’t ham it up over anything–having a human moment in front of millions of people.
Cecil the Lion lost his life at the hands of the biggest kind of coward possible in the form of American dentist Walter James Palmer. The kind that hides behind a gun playing a sport that calls on murdering a living, breathing stationary target with no means of truly defending itself.
Are there bigger, more important stories going on in the world? Yes…but it doesn’t mean we should simply ignore the smaller ones, too.
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>>Follow Joe Concha on Twitter @JoeConchaTV
This is an opinion piece. The views expressed in this article are those of just the author.
