Cecil the lion is in the news. Famous in Hwange national park in Zimbabwe for his majestic black-fringed mane, it was recently killed by Walter Palmer, a dentist from Minneapolis, Minnesota. On top of that, the lion was also skinned and beheaded. The dentist is now in trouble not only from the authorities in Zimbabwe, because all the animals in the park are protected, but also from his own patients. Thus he has written to his patients to apologize. But the exterior of his dental practice is now plastered with colorful posters. “Rot in hell,” says one. And another is kind of bloodcurdling: “Palmer, there’s a deep cavity waiting for you!” What amazes me about the brouhaha is the very nature of the public outcry. Many a lion is killed left and right, but without any notice, for they are nameless. Which is why they are nigh irrelevant from the vantage point of the general public. Cecil the lion is an entirely different story, and the American dentist will not be left off the hook lightly. Chances are that he will have to change his own name, relocate to one of the coasts, and start his dental practice anew. And all in the name of environmental protection, of all things. The best that environmental activists can do at present is to assign names, preferably American ones, to all the wild animals of note. Mildred the giraffe. Dwayne the rhino. Or Rosalind the ostrich. Every hunter who even attempts to kill any of them will rot in hell for sure.