Saturday, August 31, 2013
Canned Hunting - Warning: Offensive to Humane Beings
On the news today, this woman in Montreal who paid $15,000 to volunteer at a supposed sanctuary, later found out the baby lion she had bottle-fed was slated to be killed in what turned out to be a canned hunting compound. She is raising money to return to Africa, buy the lion and take it to a real sanctuary.
"Hunters" pay big bucks to shoot a lion raised in captivity, who is trapped in a compound with no chance of escape. I have come across varying figures these great white hunters happily pay for the privilege of murdering these beautiful and endangered creatures: 3,000 pounds to 30,000 pounds, $40,000........I dont understand it. I could not do such a thing if someone paid me a million dollars.
I discovered online there are now more captive lions in South Africa than in the wild. The lucky ones are rescued from canned hunting by REAL sanctuaries, which are always desperately under-funded and doing heroic work.
Researching this, I found out more horrible facts than I wanted to know: how the breeders of captive lions, remove the cubs from the mother early, so she will become fertile again and breed quickly.
I saw an image, on another film, of a cornered lion being shot by hunters. He knew he could not escape, and courageously lunged forward, meeting the bullets head-on. I will never forget the look in his eyes.
No words, kids. One more instance of brutal inhumanity and unfathomable horror.
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My heart breaks for these majestic animals, and all the others who senselessly die by the hands of man.
ReplyDeletegod, it is heartbreaking....we take life as if it is ours...this is not dominion but slaughter....
ReplyDeleteI didn't watch the video...I was afraid to...but I know about canned hunts, and you know how much I love and admire big cats. The people who do this have no souls.
ReplyDeleteI have no words.
ReplyDeleteOmigawd, Sherry. I got your e-mail and thought "what lions?" so I came over to your blog and read this. I can't see videos on this browser and I don't intend to put it on my other browser because I don't want to see it.
ReplyDeleteMy stomach is just sick at the thought of it.
Some people are just inhuman. As Shay said, they have no souls. I am crying for the woman who bottle-raised a lion cub and now knows it will be killed. That's like imagining someone shooting Lindy or Jasmine.
Oh, Sherry, this is awful. And meanwhile, people in Africa are still kidnapping boys and turning them into small soldiers. What kind of world is this?
In the meantime, John Mead at Blue Lion blog is posting photos of big cats from his camera safari, on his blog and on FB, and they're so beautiful. Oh no, now I'm thinking about "Born Free" which was such a wonder of a movie when we were young, remember? Egad, I can't believe people like those hunters really exist.