Climate change, overconsumption, land-use intensification, widespread pollution, and other environmentally damaging factors are threatening Earth’s biodiversity and its ability to provide ecosystem services essential for human survival. Efforts to address this systemic degradation require a species- and ecosystem-based focus and an equal focus on the well-being of people depending on wild resources. Instead, Wallach et al. (2018) champion the cause of wildlife individuals as the primary focus for action under the framework of compassionate conservation. According to them, compassionate conservation “aims to safeguard Earth’s biological diversity while retaining a commitment to treating individuals with respect and concern for their well-being.” The 4 key tenets of this approach include: “do no harm; individuals matter; inclusivity; and peaceful coexistence” (Wallach et al. 2018:1258). They attempt to argue that compassionate conservation is the ethically most defensible approach to conservation. We agree that compassion is a laudable attribute, and support efforts to ensure ethical treatment of animals and to reduce unnecessary suffering. But, Wallach et al. propose an alarmingly simplistic approach based on concern for the welfare of individual wild animals irrespective of whether the focus on individuals threatens the survival of other life forms, including human beings, or actually delivers on conservation goals. Our view is that compassionate conservation as conceptualized by Wallach et al. is seriously flawed. Compassion need not preclude humanely killing an animal if that reduces the animal’s suffering, enhances the survival of the species or its habitat, or safeguards human life or other more threatened species. But Wallach et al. argue that to be compassionate, one should not kill animals for any reason. Furthermore, it is deeply problematic that proponents of compassionate conservation claim the concept is ethically expansive when it focuses on the well-being of individual wild animals without adequately considering the well-being or worldviews of the many humans who live in proximity to wildlife. Better conservation practice requires that conservation professionals recognize the outcomes and consequences of their recommendations and actions (Saberwal & Kothari 1996; Jacobson & McDuff 1998).