PETA and Pet Policy

PETA and Pet Policy -- I have a bone to pick with PETA. Although I like a lot of what PETA do (many cat and dog breeders, though, don't like or hate PETA) I disagree with one of their concepts or thoughts. They say that they would prefer it if people didn't keep pets, cats and dogs as it is not in the cats or dogs interest. They believe that the institution of pet keeping should never have existed. Fair enough, I get their point. They prefer that cats, for example, live a natural existence and they disagree with all the surrounding paraphernalia of keeping cats as pets such as breeding cats and abandoned cats etc.

What they seem to have forgotten is that the the cat is self-domesticated. The wild cat wanted to come in from the cold. The wild cat chose to live in close proximity to people because it was in its interest to do so. This was a selfish action on behalf of the wildcat. He or she lent on the altruistic behavior of the human farmer. OK it was symbiotic too, both gaining something out of the relationship. The cat got food and shelter and the farmer controlled the rodent population.

To unravel that very successful relationship would, on the face of it, be against the cat's interests. I think what they mean to say is that the intial symbiotic relationship that worked well thousands of years ago has now become distorted and lost its way to the point where it could be argued that the domestic cat could be better off not being domesticated. In other words we need to turn the clock back. It is probably the influence of commerce that has interfered to the detriment of the once simple and harmonous relationship betweem cat and human. That point could be argued. But a wholesale elimination of the concept of the domestication of the cat is more difficult to support. Provided the wider issues are looked at and the collateral problems that have sprung up and successfully resolved domestication would seem to be in the cat's interests.

PETA and Pets to Cats and the Law

PETA and Pet Policy