BAN TROPHY AND CANNED HUNTING IN CECIL'S NAME

Cecil the lion, the patriarch and defender of a family of a dozen cubs, was recently killed by an American dentist who wanted a lion's head on his wall.
The dentist, Walter Palmer, along with his hunting party, tied a dead animal to a vehicle in order to lure Cecil out of the national park.
He blinded Cecil with a spotlight and then shot him with a high-powered crossbow.
Cecil hid in the bush, no doubt suffering greatly from a steel arrow in his body.
When Cecil was found – 40 hours later – the hunter shot him with a gun and had him beheaded and skinned.
Hunting is a coward's pastime.
The HSUS and Humane Society International (HSI) strongly urge the US to cooperate with the extradition effort. They are introducing a bill to ban all imports of trophies and parts from African lions and other at-risk species into the US. The bill is called the Conserving Ecosystems by Ceasing the Importation of Large (CECIL) Animal Trophies Act.
That's because Palmer is not so different from thousands of other wealthy trophy hunters in the US and throughout the world, killing the largest "specimens" of the rarest mammals. Baiting, jacklighting, shooting in parks or fenced areas, with guides even drugging animals to allow these aging men to shoot these magnificent creatures, are all par for the course. That's their hobby, albeit a warped, selfish, and inhumane one. It's going on every day in the remote reaches of the globe, enabled by professional guides and wildlife officials who are at least complicit if not directly on the take from rich people with a mania for killing the most beautiful creatures in the world.
Apparently, the authorities have charged the guide involved and plan to bring charges against the landowner, who knew exactly what they were doing. Palmer has a museum full of dead animals registered in the Pope and Young and Safari Club International record books — from lions to polar bears to rhinos, most of them taken with bow and arrow. Throughout his life, he has intentionally sought out the biggest specimens of animals in order to get his name memorialized as a "successful" trophy hunter. He had designs on Cecil because he was one of the biggest lions around. This was not chance, as Palmer claimed; it was a professional hit.
Zimbabwe should follow in the footsteps of Botswana and ban all trophy hunting, stepping into the era of wildlife watching and appreciation. Eco-tourism dwarfs trophy hunting in its economic impact, and it's got great promise as a sustainable means of livelihood for Africans and African economies. Kenya, Rwanda, Uganda, and other nations are showing the way. Now it's time for Zimbabwe to stop allowing targets on the backs of its glorious and diminishing wildlife.
It's time for these nations to tell the Walter Palmers that the world is no longer open for the kind of business they want to pursue — bloody, ruthless, with no moral value, and one of such depravity that it is an ugly mark on all of humanity.
Let's all spill out our passion, and end killing, murdering of wildlife that deserve to live free, and be safe always. We can change the world in the best way one step at a time.

Sincerely,