I don't wish to "de-intellectualize" some fabulously well-expressed posts, but even a low-brow knuckle-dragger such as myself had to marvel how deftly and shrewdly the media brought the late Cecil the lion up to the level of we humans. Perhaps it was his friendly and benign name: Cecil. Cecil is a goofball name of a creature you could play fetch with and teach really neat tricks and he wouldn't reciprocate by eating you. By contrast a lion name Conan would likely devour your balls the moment he lay eyes on you.
It's an interesting point that you make about the name, here is an article from the Guardian
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/shortcuts/2015/jul/29/cecil-the-lion-doomed-name in which the author argues that "By naming a wild animal, it is instantly appropriated, and demeaned. It becomes acculturated, part of our human discourse. Cecil’s end was in sight as soon as he was christened; he became a target as sure as if someone had drawn a bull’s eye on his rump." He makes some, what I thought, were very good points but then gets ripped to pieces by commenters who make equally as good points.
As a side issue, I know you weren't questioning why the lion was called Cecil but I think I'm right in saying that he was named after Cecil Rhodes a British imperialist, businessman, mining magnate, and politician in South Africa. He was also allegedly the founder of the southern African territory of Rhodesia, which was named after him in 1895. Though how a British person or any other foreign person can have 'found' a foreign country is beyond me. Rhodesia was the former name of what is now called Zimbabwe where both Cecil's lie in peace.
The fact a lion in Zimbabwe was named after a westerner probably says a lot about where his 'celebrity' status was intended to have the most impact.
The fact the the comments on this thread have dwindled at the same rate as the story itself has dwindled in the media is no surprise. It's not that we find it any less despicable, it's just the way news works. Anyone who thinks that they are bang up to date with current affairs is kidding themselves. It wouldn't be possible to know everything, there wouldn't be enough time to tell it, so the people who report the news select a certain amount of news that is to be broadcast. Because of this inevitable process there is an almost seemingly mercenary element where news editors will in effect select the most news worthy deaths and catastrophes. Therefore the man who died falling through his greenhouse and the newlywed couple that died swept away to sea on the first day of their honeymoon (both true examples) are deemed as more newsworthy than an old age pensioner who died after a heart attack. All deaths are equally important to us but not for the news people, they select and in some ways it seems kind of sick. So for the people that are shouting why are we not kicking up a fuss about killings in such and such a country, the reason is because we don't make the news. People are the news but they don't make the news. News people make the news by selection and no matter what they select there will be 90% probably more that never gets told.
Of course we care about all the wars that are going on and all the killings that are happening we are all human but it's not up to us and even if it were it would probably be so overwhelming that we'd want to switch it off. I don't totally agree with the reaction over the death of Cecil the lion yet at the same time, I do totally understand it. I understand that people want to feel part of a movement that feels like humanity that is standing up for good. No matter how false it may seem from some people, I'm certain that it feels real to others, but regardless of both these views the majority of the intention is correct and it would be pretty hard to knock that down, even a cynic like me would find it hard.