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Dr. Palmer,DDS - may all your teeth fall out. (RIP Cecil)

dutchmuch

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Steven_Draker Mentor

Steven_Draker

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The Guardian view on Cecil the lion: the immorality is in the pleasure of the kill

This 13-year-old lion had a good life, but the manner of his death was abhorrent

 

http://i.guim.co.uk/img/media/1fde3a831f5235fcdc8895ea8c66a2c664bf44e7/0_2_620_372/master/620.jpg?w=300&q=85&auto=format&sharp=10&s=38bd49fcdfc640207ec703f1334a6c02

‘Although we mostly kill animals for food, humans are among the very few animals that kill for pure sport and the sheer pleasure of killing.’ Above, Dr Walter Palmer (left) poses with another hunter and an unidentified dead lion. Photograph: facebook

 

The death of so handsome a creature as Cecil the lion has rightly ignited global outrage. But why do we seem to care so much more about how an animal dies than how it lives? After all, Cecil had 13 free and happy years roaming Zimbabwe’s Hwange national park. In terms of suffering, the last few hours of his life, while undoubtedly painful, can hardly be compared to the miserable factory-farmed existence of so many of the creatures that end up on our plates. Cecil’s free-range existence was circumscribed by the limitations of the park – about 14,650 sq km. The average factory chicken is afforded the living space roughly equivalent to a piece of A4 paper. And they live for about six weeks, in vast filthy sheds full of their own excrement, and without any experience of sun or fresh air. From this perspective, it may seem peculiar that we focus so much of our outrage on a small-town dentist from Bloomington, Minnesota, and hand out a CBE to Bernard Matthews.

 

Furthermore, what is the difference between exploiting cattle for money and exploiting lions? In theory, at least, the income from licensed hunting – redistributing cash from Bloomington to Bulawayo – is redirecting money towards the greater need. So is the Cecil furore just a bit of western sentimentality from those who can hum The Circle of Life, but who have no real appreciation of what it means? Indeed, those who left fluffy toy animals outside Dr Palmer’s dentist surgery as a protest certainly contribute towards this reading of events. After all, if Cecil had died after a fight with a fellow lion, his death may well have been no less painful.

 

But this economist’s reasoning misses the moral point. For what’s most troubling about this case is the pleasure of the hunt. Although we mostly kill animals for food, humans are among the very few animals that kill for pure sport and the sheer pleasure of killing. It’s odd that foxes and cats – so often the objects of animal lovers’ special care – share this trait with us. Hunting connects some people to an atavistic and otherwise incommunicable instinct that can, they say, lead to some visceral sense of oneness with the natural world. For others, such as Walter the dentist, or even Hemingway’s Francis Macomber, hunting large animals suggests something considerably more sinister. For one has to ask what sort of personal inadequacies someone is making up for if they have to travel the world to find a thrill in taking life. The fact that Dr Palmer’s weapon of choice was some high-tech crossbow seems to amplify the creepy, primal connection that he sought with the suffering of his prey.

 

No doubt the suburban dentist, whose life normally revolved around other people’s molars and gum disease, got to feel a little more fully alive, a little bit more alpha male, in the face of a lion’s stare. Not that Dr Palmer was bravely recreating any sort of parity with the lion, having a professional hunter with a high-powered rifle standing at his side. Moreover, many of these lions have become so used to human beings that they hardly react to their presence. No, there was nothing brave here. Photographs of a bare-chested Dr Palmer hugging a dead leopard are reminiscent of those famous Vladimir Putin shots – both men crassly trying to telegraph their masculinity. Factory farming may be more cruel to the animals. But it takes no pleasure in its cruelty. And that’s why the condemnation of Dr Palmer is fully justified.

 

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/30/the-guardian-view-on-cecil-the-lion-the-immorality-is-in-the-pleasure-of-the-kill

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whipped guy Grand Master

whipped guy

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Looks as though I retired just in the nick of time. I would have been highly embarrassed to have shared the same profession as this despicable excuse for a human being. It's no wonder that I considered very few colleagues to be very close friends. Frankly I did not fit the mold and was always very proud of that fact.

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thickornotatall Grand Master

thickornotatall

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If you aren't hunting for food to eat...or to stop danger to the population....I want no part of that sport...if that is indeed a real sport...I know plenty of people that hunt for pleasure....their pleasure is different than my interpretation...A never ending battle of right..wrong..or who cares....I do care..I have a love for animals and am not ashamed to defend my view...This world is on a slow spin to destruction of rights...Very unhappy with this situation....

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Frequentflier Mentor

Frequentflier

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Please do not put words in someone else's mouth. Personally, I do not dislike Americans.

 

All generalizations are dangerous.

 

 

http://shelleyhallmark.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/choices-pic.jpg

 

Don't get your panties in a wad. I never said anything about your view of Americans. The sentence said "if I", not that you'd be right to dislike Americans. Gesh. By the way, I have no idea where you live or of your citizenship; don't need or care to know.

 

If there is justice in the world, hunters like Palmer come back in their next life as the hunted and hopefully by someone using an arrow.

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bigvalboy Grand Master

bigvalboy

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Don't get your panties in a wad. I never said anything about your view of Americans. The sentence said "if I", not that you'd be right to dislike Americans. Gesh. By the way, I have no idea where you live or of your citizenship; don't need or care to know.

If there is justice in the world, hunters like Palmer come back in their next life as the hunted and hopefully by someone using an arrow.

 

 

http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BNzU4MjYxMjI1N15BMl5BanBnXkFtZTgwNjk1NTAwMjE@._V1_UX140_CR0,0,140,209_AL_.jpg

 

Here ya go.....(Just to be clear, Palmer would be the hunted.)

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Steven_Draker Mentor

Steven_Draker

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Don't get your panties in a wad. I never said anything about your view of Americans. The sentence said "if I", not that you'd be right to dislike Americans. Gesh. By the way, I have no idea where you live or of your citizenship; don't need or care to know.

 

Anonymity brings out the worst in people.

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whipped guy Grand Master

whipped guy

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I predict that a Zimbabwean prison is about to receive some good dental care soon.

Personally I think that the "good" Dr. Palmer should be on the receiving end of some "good" Zimbabwean dental care... and I don't think that they routinely use local anesthetics in Zimbabwe from what I hear! :eek: [Also insert evil grin here!]

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rickvt Explorer

rickvt

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surprise, surprise....

 

Palmer is not the first American to make an illegal kill.....

 

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/zimbabwe-names-second-american-lion-killer-n402776

 

what is it with these American doctors?;)

And now Cecil's brother is murdered as well....

surprise, surprise....

 

Palmer is not the first American to make an illegal kill.....

 

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/zimbabwe-names-second-american-lion-killer-n402776

 

what is it with these American doctors?;)

 

Cecil's Brother is Alive and Well..

http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/02/world/cecil-the-lion-brother-jericho-alive/

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whipped guy Grand Master

whipped guy

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Here is one more thing that sheds light on another aspect of his persona. Palmer agreed to a settlement with the Minnesota Board of Dentistry over allegations that he sexually harassed a receptionist.

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3180304/Karma-b-h-Woman-sexually-harassed-dentist-killed-Cecil-lion-speaks-vilified-world.html

 

CLCIlPTWoAAfgEW.jpg

 

Also, it probably looks pleasing to the untrained eye, but if I have ever seems a more phony smile (as in that ain't what natural teeth are supposed to look like) it's that of the illustrious Dr. Palmer.

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