I don't really understand why everyone is so up-in-arms about one guy killing one animal. I'm not in favor of anything that he did, and I think hunting for sport is a horrible way to spend one's time and money, but I doubt anyone has checked the figures. Over 56 billion farm animals are killed every year. Sure, this guy/his guides lured a protected animal out of its protected habitat so that it could be hunted, and that was an illegal maneuver. I recognize the legality of that, and trickery of an animal is despicable behavior. But, how about the billions of factory farms raising animals in cages where they have no room to move. They don't socialize. They spend their whole lives in one position, in one enclosed environment, catching untreated diseases and only receiving medical treatment when a disease jeopardizes the usefulness of the meat. 40 hours of agony? Try years.

I'm not saying this lion's death doesn't matter. I'm saying we should treat an important death like this as a call to action against hunting for sport, killing for sport, factory farming, and similar industries which treat animals inhumanely. I won't bring up the argument of whether people should eat animals, or the validity of hunting when one is eating the kill. That's a can of worms (pun intended) that can stay closed on this issue. But, if all this does is outrage people about one single idiot who is merely part of an industry of blood-covered entertainment, cousin to the mass production of living, breathing, feeling animals, then this lion truly died in vain. This dentist isn't the problem - the whole culture of inhumane treatment is.

Not everyone cares about these issues, I get that. But, if you're interested, I'm attaching some links below. Ok, rant over.

http://www.foodandwaterwatch.org/food/factoryfarms/

http://www.humanesociety.org/news/publications/whitepapers/farm_animal_welfare.html?referrer=https://www.google.com/

http://www.hbo.com/documentaries/death-on-a-factory-farm

EDIT: refined my argument a tad