Blog Post #6: Trophy Hunting: Should people be allowed to hunt exotic animals like lions in Africa?

June Choi

EW2-020

December 08, 2015

 

Trophy Hunting: Should People Be Allowed To Hunt Exotic Animals Like Lions In Africa?

Figure 1. An Elk

In my opinion, hunting exotic animals such as lions should be prohibited to conserve population of endangered species and to protect the rights of animals. [1] According to Savetherhino.com, trophy hunting is defined as " a specific and selective legal form of wildlife use that involves payment for a hunting experience and the acquisition of a trophy by the hunter and is only allowed under strict permit conditions". In these days, there is on-going controversy on trophy hunting whether can be justified. Those who hunt exotic animals in Africa pay a great amount of money in order to hunt exotic animals. On the other hand, many ecologists attempt to save the endangered species to balance the ecosystem. The problem is that the influence of trophy hunting impacts on significant decline in population of many exotic species. Why does trophy hunting affect to the significant drops in population of exotic animals despite of the strict permit conditions? First of all, the permit on trophy hunting is being abused, so the effort of conservation on endangered species would be collapsed. [2] Originally, the purpose of legal trophy hunting is to raise money for conservation efforts, according to National Geographic, and it is only allowed in some African countries such as Zimbabwe and South Africa. However, animals living in the National Park are banned to hunt even in Zimbabwe and South Africa. [3] According to Wikipedia, the lion Cecil, a major attraction at the park and was being studied and tracked by the University of Oxford as part of a larger study since 1999, was wounded with an arrow by a big game hunter, Walter Palmer, and approximately 40 hours later, killed with a rifle outside of the park. In fact, Walter Palmer intended to draw out Cecil to outside of the National Park, but he denied that the killing Cecil is not an illegal act because he paid $50,000 and Cecil was not killed in the park. Of course, the rule of trophy hunting is very confusing that only animals roaming in the National Park can be protected; however, this doesn’t mean that trophy hunts can be justified. [2]According to National Geographic, when a dominant male lion is killed, another male will take his place at the head of the pride. Typically, he will kill any existing cubs, in order to make room for his own offspring. Cecil had an estimated 24 cubs among six lionesses. This also tells that trophy hunting can significantly affect to the drops in population of lions (endangered species). Second, animals are not tools that humans like to play with. Animals are living beings that have own rights of their lives. Humans cannot violate the rights of their lives for selfishness. Some people tend to like to show off their unique experiences to others and feel catharsis on killing exotic animals. In the case of Cecil, Walter Palmer shot Cecil with the arrow and left for 40 hours. This tells how much he was so brutal that Cecil suffered from the wound for approximately 2 days and was finally killed with a gun. In my understanding, his intent on leaving wounded Ceil for 40 hours is not acceptable. It is inevitable to make the judgment that he definitely enjoyed having fun on watching Cecil’s death. [4] According to Keith Taylor, Green party MEP for south-east England, said, “It’s outrageous that lions are being killed just so someone in Europe can decorate their home with the body parts.” This tells how much the result of sacrifice is meaningless and the human beings are cruel to animals. [2] Moreover, according to National Geographic, skins, bones, and other materials resulting from a hunt can find their way into the black market, where they fuel demand in Asia for traditional cures or status symbols. This tells that dead bodies of exotic animals would go to the illegal black market for edible purpose as well. For these two reasons, exotic animals like lions are not belongings to humans and should be protected for the sustainability of the species.

 

<Works Cited>

 

[1] Save The Rhino. (n.d.). What is trophy hunting. Retrieved from https://www.savetherhino.org/assets/0001/7279/What_is_trophy_hunting.pdf on December 05, 2015

 

[2] Howard, B. (2015, July 28). Killing of Cecil the Lion Sparks Debate Over Trophy Hunts. National Geographic. Retrieved from http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/07/150728-cecil-lion-killing-trophy-hunting-conservation-animals/ on December 05, 2015

 

[3] Killing of Cecil the lion. (n.d.). In Wikipedia. Retrieved December 05, 2015, from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Killing_of_Cecil_the_lion

 

[4] Vaughan, A. (2015, July 27). Killing of Cecil the lion prompts calls for EU ban on importing lion trophies. theguardian. Retrieved from http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jul/27/killing-of-cecil-the-lion-prompts-call-for-eu-ban-on-importing-lion-trophies on December 05, 2015
 

<Reference Image by>

 

Figure 1: An Elk - Michael Zavros. (2008). Yatzer. Retrieved from https://www.yatzer.com/trophy-hunter-michael-zavros on December 05, 2015

 

 

Blog Post #5

EW2-020

June Choi

November 14, 2015

The Process of Obtaining My Knowledge Ownership

I’ve learned so many things in English Writings 2 class so that my knowledge in English writing has resulted in improvement. One of the acquirements in knowledge is citation. My professor, Gary went over so many lectures about citation in class and after class, and has always pointed out to include citations as APA format. I never experienced citing sources with APA format, so it took me a lot of time to figure about. Although I used the citation machine and tried to clarify where the sources came from, some sources were uncertain that I could rarely find information about the sources. Therefore, I had to look up Goolge and to study by my own to be clear with APA format. From now on, I am quite brilliant at utilizing APA format while citing and can confidently say aloud that I could apply the knowledge to other writings besides blog posts. At first, I wasn’t sure why Gary emphasizes having citations is so important and actually disliked spending so much time in explaining the importance of citations. However, after I posted several writings on my blog, I realized that having citations makes my writings more professional and credible. Moreover, credibility of source makes my writings reliable, and the support of my thesis is much stronger. More citations makes increase in reliability and helped me to shape my supporting sentences as well. I think, because of the importance, Gary talked about credibility of sources throughout two class periods, and I clearly understood why the citation is crucial in order to perfect my writings. In brief, I became acknowledged with the importance of citation, and I believe the knowledge is about to start to be embedded in my blog posts.