Cecil the Lion Has Nothing to Do With Your Politics [View all]
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/122410/cecil-lion-has-nothing-do-your-politics
An outpouring of indignation over the killing of Cecil the Lion has unleashed a cross-ideological pandemic of whataboutism. The liberal expression is well represented by this Jelani Cobb tweet.
jelani cobb @jelani9
I effing hate that they killed that lion. Also hate that dentist could've shot an unarmed black teen and we wouldn't be having this convo.
11:22 AM - 29 Jul 2015
895 895 Retweets 795 795 favorites
Meanwhile, a whole bunch of conservatives are arguing that anyone outraged by the killing of a lion should be at least as outraged over the fact that Planned Parenthood preserves fetal tissue from abortions for medical research.
Yep, we've seen those (plus vegangelism and other attention-seeking kvetching.
Generating a consensus here is easy, precisely because it’s a single incident that occurred in a gray area–free realm. The act itself was cowardly. It was undertaken by a person from our country. And it is considered a great loss to a lot of people without any discernible upside. People are right to be disturbed by it, even if they expend no emotional energy whatsoever condemning police violence, abortion, meat-eating, hunting, or Donald Trump.
Apparently it needed to be explained that the killing of an iconic lion isn't analytically similar to abortion and police brutality.
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