If you've been anywhere remotely near the Internet this week, you've heard about Cecil the Lion, who was a local favorite in Zimbabwe. Cecil was kind to humans and would even pose calmly for photographs.
Of course, we can't have nice things, so Minnesota dentist Walter Palmer paid $50,000 to go with a pair of guides and shoot and kill Cecil. Never mind that Cecil was illegally baited out of his habitat, shot with an arrow and then tracked for 40 hours before finally being shot and killed. For his part, Palmer has stated he didn't know Cecil was a beloved lion until the end of the hunt, and he felt everything was done legally. But this is also the same guy who was arrested for a felony in 2008 because he lied about where he killed a bear, and also just seems like a general terrible human being, so I'm not taking much of what he says seriously.
Jimmy Kimmel spoke of the incident on Jimmy Kimmel Live, and even got a little choked talking about Cecil. He encouraged viewers to turn this into a positive thing, and suggested visiting www.wildcru.org to learn more and donate to wildlife conservation. For someone who's made a living off of generally juvenile (though often very funny) videos, this was a mature, thoughtful response to a terrible situation. Way to go, Jimmy.
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