Cold Sphynx cat looking like an old man in a doorway

This is a picture of a cold Sphynx cat bent over in a slightly strange position with an interesting expression and an overall appearance which reminds me of an old man with a bent back walking down a street or standing in a doorway on a cold winter night. Perhaps my imagination is running riot and perhaps I am anthropomorphising this cat too much. We nearly always anthropomorphise our cats. But look at the expression on his face. At the base of the page I explain why I think he has taken up this position.

Sphynx cat huddles over warm air vent to keep warm inside the home. Photo: Reddit.

It's a peculiar position and his owner says that he always does this when he's cold. And when I read that information I questioned what she was doing. Why did she allow him to get cold and then photograph him and upload the photograph to the Internet?

Would it not have been better if she had kept him warm? The trouble with that suggestion is that if she had kept him warm he wouldn't have looked like this. And she wouldn't have been able to take an interesting photograph of her cat. In turn, that would have prevented her uploading an interesting cat photograph to the Internet. You can see what I'm getting at. A problem for Sphynx cats is that they are very photogenic. You can get a lot of very good photographs of these hairless cats.

She let him get cold so she could get a good picture for social media consumption. Personally, I don't like it. I think social media is undermining cat welfare. And I'm including YouTube. All those funny cat videos are in fact videos of cats often being stressed and anxious. People don't like to discuss it but I refuse to let it go.

RELATED: Do Sphynx cats smell?

I don't want to be curmudgeonly but there has to be a balance between animal welfare and making some money on YouTube through advertising. That is the reason why people make funny cat videos. You can make more money on YouTube advertising through Google AdSense then you can through a website i.e. the written word. YouTube can be quite a good earner.

The problem is that the YouTube administrators have gradually, over the years, added to the amount of advertising on uploaded videos. They've absolutely maxed it out to the point where it can be irritating to watch a video because it is interrupted too much by adverts. I'm digressing.

RELATED: Are Sphynx cats hypoallergenic?

Back to the cat. Despite my criticism, it is an interesting photograph. I would say that the reason why he looks like this is because he's keeping himself warm over the warm air vent which is right in front of him! The photographer knows that.

It is hardly worth saying but Sphynx cats are hairless and therefore they feel the cold. You've got to keep your home warm. That's going to cost extra money. Sphynx cats require enhanced cat caretaking (bathing for instance) which is perhaps something that people don't take fully into consideration when they adopt one.

Scary cat video. Cat looking like a monster emerges from under the bed

This is Toby from the Instagram account: 'tummyandgummy'. He has the feline version of Ehlers-danlos syndrome, which is what makes his skin so loose and also very prone to serious cuts. It is also called Cutaneous Asthenia. Ehlers-danlos syndrome affects the connective tissue. It is an inherited, genetic disease. The skin, as you can see in the video, is stretchy and loose. It is also fragile. It is caused by a genetic mutation which affects the production of collagen. The collagen fibres have an abnormal structure which weakens the skin making it prone to damage.

The joints are also lax. A slight scratch can damage and tear the skin. The skin can become scarred. This deficiency in collagen can also have an impact on other tissues of the body such as the blood vessels, heart and the eyes. If a kitten is severely affected, they may not survive. If the condition is mild or moderate cats can live to a normal lifespan. If the skin tears and is bruised it can be painful and it can cause irritation. Owners have to bear this in mind and reduce the risk of skin damage by removing sharp or rough objects in the cat's environment. Regrettably, there is also an argument to de-claw the cat to stop them scratching themselves.

Thankfully, Toby has not been declawed because we can see is clause in the video. Well-done to his human caregivers. This is a rare condition. In affects Himalayan cats more than other breeds. The gene concerned is an autosomal recessive.

Cat with feline version of Ehlers Danlos. Screenshot from Instagram video.

In the video we see him under the bed sliding out like an undersea monster or one of those zombies from The Walking Dead whose been in water for 18 months. Sorry if that is insulting to this cat but that is what it looks like to me. It is a bit shocking really. You might know that I don't like to see cats with medical conditions that make them look strange being exploited on social media. It seems entirely wrong to me. We wouldn't do it with humans so why do it with cats? Because they are second class citizens. Yeh, I know I am being incredibly boring and tiresome but that's the way I see it although I understand the motivation: to get viewers, followers and fame.

Toby has social media fame as he would because he looks so damned strange. I have written about him before - click to read and see if you wish.

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A post shared by Toby 🦓 & Quinton 🦁 + Leo 🐯 (@tummyandgummy)

Note: This is a video from another website. Sometimes they are deleted at source which stops them working on this site. If that has happened, I apologise but I have no control over it.

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'Truffles' - from unwanted stray kitten to treasured working cat

This is an excellent example of how an "ordinary" unwanted stray cat is, in fact, a very valuable cat and that value has been shown to the public because Truffles is now a sweet working cat helping children to accept their new glasses at an optometrist called A Child's Eyes. She is described as "an ambassador for vision" by the pediatric optometrist whose name is Danielle Crull.

Truffles the optometrist's working cat. Photo: her Instagram account.

Daniel believes that Truffles was born in July 2016 as a stray cat and was adopted by Danielle and her family in October 2016. And quickly, they both benefited. Truffles is a working cat because she's very useful in promoting Danielle's business and settling down the children to make the experience for them more enjoyable. At the same time, of course, Truffles is a beautiful cat companion.

For me, there's nothing more pleasant to see than a well looked after working cat contributing to human society while at the same time having a good life. It's a way of adding value to the domestic cat which in my view is undervalued in general. When you add this value to a domestic cat, they are better protected. They are safer and of course admired.

Danielle makes tiny glasses for Truffles and she found that she was able to wear them. When children came into the "optical shop" as Danielle calls it, Truffles is able to demonstrate the glasses to children and it helps to put them at ease. And she says that Truffles helps to build the children's self- esteem.

Truffles glasses don't have lenses in them, obviously, and Danielle finds that she enjoys wearing them. This sweet kitty has six pairs of glasses and she will wear one for an hour or more. She'll even go to sleep wearing a pair of glasses. Truffles is a celebrity cat with the usual social media websites. She has 15,500 followers on Instagram for instance. Pretty cool.

Truffles is a tuxedo cat with britches and a ruff! She's very classy.

Here is a video of her at the shop:

Objectifying women - the cycle that constantly reinforces it

This had nothing to do with domestic cats directly but I feel compelled to write about it because I see it all the time and it annoys me. Indirectly what I am saying affects cat welfare. Celebrity woman can dress more functionally and promote cat welfare in one of many ways. They have the clout.

I want women to be totally equal to men but if celebrity women wear sexy clothes and the news media reports on it as the Daily Mail has done in this example then we simply reinforce the objectification of women and we ogle them as some sort of sex objects. It has to stop. Note: Sexual objectification is the act of treating a person solely as an object of sexual desire.

Objectifying women. The cycle the reinforces this concept.

A celebrity woman wears sexy clothes and the news media report on it, such as above: Mabel sets pulses soaring in a figure-hugging halterneck jumpsuit. It is a self-perpetuating cycle. And some women complain about being objectified. A lot do as far as I can tell. Do they really mean it?

As it happens so much, maybe this is the way it should be? Maybe this is the male-female relationship. But I hear women complaining about being objectified as sex objects. They want to be treated as equals and I totally get that and support the goal. 

But when they dress in sexy clothes (which is perfectly okay) and they are reported in the news media as illustrated by the Daily Mail online newspaper we reinforce the objectification of women. They are nothing more than to be looked at for their appearance. That is the role of women in this vicious cycle which constantly reinforces this stereotype. 

If women want to break out of it, they have to wear loose fitting boring trousers and cover up their torso. In short, they should dress more like men which they will totally hate and it is an untenable idea. 

They want to be attractive and they do it for themselves. It's instinctive. It is part of their DNA and inherited genetically. It is meant to attract for mating purposes. There has to be a compromise somewhere down the line which means wearing less sexy clothes and the news media stopping these sorts of headlines.

The trouble with writing about women on a cat website is that Google never finds the page and therefore nobody reads it! Which is why I have to write this incredibly quickly because I am basically wasting my time. I hope somebody reads it and comments. I will waffle on to make the page larger which may help Google find it.

It is beyond time that this unhealthy relationship between celebrity women and the news media is broken. It simply reinforces over and over again that women are sex objects. Both parties are equally to blame. I don't want to spoil the fun because I know women enjoy wearing these sorts of garments but there is a much wider issue, one of equality, total equality and the way men perceive women. 

If men perceive women as sex objects, they are never going to be equal in the wider sense. Certainly, many women are completely equal in the workplace and in life generally but overall, you see a lack of equality and it is deeply entrenched.

By equality I don't mean that women should do men's work. They don't need to behave like men and become directors of companies which is a miserable job. Trying to force women into top executive jobs in big companies I think is unhealthy as well because I don't think women are geared up for that kind of role. You have to be a completely driven testosterone-fuelled male to do that. But there are many roles that women can fill and they should be allowed to do them in an atmosphere of complete equality.

Facebook rules on not selling animals are being ignored

Facebook knows that they need to do more to stop the sale of animals on their website. This is a perpetually difficult topic for Facebook administrators it seems to me. They have similar problems in trying to stop pictures of animal abuse.

FB policy on selling animals. It is banned but abused. Screenshot. It took me a while to find this FB page.

NOTE TO FACEBOOK: PLEASE DON'T PUNISH ME FOR HIGHLIGHTING THIS PROBLEM AT 21ST FEB 2021. THE REASON FOR THE POST IS TO IMPROVE ANIMAL WELFARE.

The first point I want to make is that it is very difficult to find Facebook's policy on listing animal sales on their website. If you search for the policy on Facebook you can't find it. If you search for their rules or policy using Google search you are more likely to find it. That tells a tale in my opinion.

Several people have asked for information about the rules but the responses are often very thin and weak and unhelpful. I eventually found an answer and I have provided both the rules and a Google search result in screenshots to tell you the kind of problem that Facebook faces.

Yes, Google search throws up many Facebook pages on which they sell animals. In fact is much easier to find Facebook pages where they sell animals than it is to find Facebook's policy on not selling animals! Something is wrong.

Animals for sale of Facebook listed by Google search. Screenshot.

For the sake of clarity, it is irresponsible to sell animals on Facebook and it is irresponsible to buy animals on Facebook. I know it is tempting as it is highly convenient and there are some beautiful animals for sale but you are taking a big risk financially and in terms of the quality animal you are buying. Also the animals themselves at risk of abuse and exploitation. You don't know who is selling them and how they were bred.

You don't know the standard of their welfare. Are the kittens diseased? Are they sick? Do they have any sort of health issue which may leave the buyer with heavy financial expenditure in terms of veterinary bills and emotional distress because once they adopt a kitten they almost immediately become attached to that animal. To see the animal in distress because of illness is distressing to the new owner.

This is an example of the risk you take if you buy online without ticking the normal boxes and applying due diligence to the process. I don't believe you can buy a kitten or cat on impulse at any time. It has to be carried out with great care because this is a lifetime experience that the person is buying into.

The trouble is that people do not consider it a lifetime experience. Some people do but the ones who buy on Facebook often don't. And also in buying on Facebook you are encouraging people to sell on Facebook. You are completing the circle.

I know Facebook don't want this to happen and their rules are clear once you find them but they struggle with enforcing the rules for the simple reason that there are so many users and postings on their website. The numbers are too big to control.

Story of Logan - werewolf street cat - is full of sadness, love, joy and more sadness

Logan was a rescue cat. He was saved from a very harsh life on the street. We are not told where or I can't find out where. He became famous because of his face, I guess. They called him a 'werewolf cat'. Are they referring to the cat breed the Lykoi also called the werewolf cat . They appear to be. But is Logan a lykoi?  Lykois are rare purebred cats. But maybe I am missing something as I have not followed this story very closely.

Logan is, I believe, a random bred cat and it seems that he lost some of his facial hair because of his ill-health (eye infection that spread to the area below his eyes?). Or was it ringworm? I don't believe so. He became very ill as a street cat. The vet thought he had FIP and he certainly suffered from viral and bacterial infections, infected eyes and teeth and so on. 

Logan a rescue cat with fur missing from his face  -- called 'werewolf cat' Photo: Tabatha Norton on Instagram.

His foster carer, Tabatha Norton, took care of him brilliantly and her vet was superb. The public rallied around and I presume helped to fund the medical treatment. All was going well on Logan's long journey back to health which was reported on Instagram started by Tabatha Norton. I guess she started the account because of Logan's appearance. Would she have started a social media account if Logan had been a standard black cat? Sorry, I don't want to be a wet blanket and no criticism meant but...

Logan's bloodwork came back normal one day and it seemed that he was out of the woods. Norton was elated and hopeful.

HIS BLOODWORK CAME BACK NORMAL!!! NO more high globulins and proteins! No more high neutrophils and white blood cell count! His source of infection (teeth/ gums and feline herpes virus flare up due to chronic pain and stress) has been treated and the infection is now gone! We can’t even put in words how ecstatic we are about this news!!! This has been such a long journey!

But then...suddenly Logan died and the last post on the Instagram account is the video below. Norton was wiped out by the suddenness of his death. She couldn't post to social media for a few months and then told Logan's followers that he'd died. She does not tell us why he died. She loved him deeply. It is great that he was loved so profoundly by his carer.

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A post shared by Rescue Logan (@rescuelogan)

Perhaps he died of old age. He looks quite old. Sometimes cats do pass away like this. Unexpectedly.

Norton's words are poetic and poignant: 

He meant EVERYTHING to me. I cannot imagine my life without him. My strong survivor, my little warrior, my baby is now an angel in heaven. I am so grateful that we were able to spend so much time together and that I told you how special you are and how loved you are each and every day. Logan, you were my life, I LOVE YOU SO MUCH and you will ALWAYS be with me in my heart.

The fur on his body does not look too bad. Lykoi cats have very sparse hair, not like this.

The hair on Logan's back and flanks is not that bad. Photo: Instagram.

READ ARTICLES ABOUT CAT RESCUE

Picture of a cat on hiking trip. Is it an unrealistic dream?

I'm asking the simple question whether it is a good idea to take your cat hiking. You put your cat in a backpack and off you go. The picture looks great. You are stimulating your cat to the maximum. Your cat has got used to it and therefore 'behaves'. It has taken some time to achieve this. Because at the beginning your cat wouldn't cooperate. 

You tried a lead and she just fell over so it's taken months and months to get her to the position where she cooperates and comes along with you on a hiking trip. But when you go for a walk along a hiking trail she wants to go left and right and stop and sniff. So you make about a mile of progress and consider that to be a great success. Then you go back to your campervan.

Picture of a domestic cat on a hiking trip. Is it an unrealistic dream that is being sold? Pic in public domain.

It is a good idea? That's why I have put the question inside the picture. Because it looks really good but we do not know what happens behind the scene? You see some wonderful photographs of cats in beautiful places on Instagram. You might see a cat with a dog and they have been carefully arranged. The background is magnificent with mountains and lakes or a superb forest. A lot of work goes into this photography and the distinct impression is 'great success'.

But is it just a dream that is being sold to people? It's a dream to people who live in the urban environment. Who struggle with day-to-day living. Their cat is a full-time indoor cat because it's unsafe outside. The owners of the cat love their cat and want to do more for them but they struggle to earn a living and therefore are not at home enough.

They worry that their cat is stressed and they want to enrich the life of their cat. The pictures on Instagram of a beautiful Bengal cat in front of a lake switches them on to the possibility that they could give their cat this kind of life.

But, and this is the big but, is it really feasible? Is it too complicated? Is it workable? Is it viable? Are the people who publish these photographs on social media simply doing it as a business to make money and to become influencers? That is probably what is happening but they are inadvertently or deliberately selling a dream. A dream that is probably and possibly unattainable for the vast majority of people. It may be impractical and probably is.

If my assessment is somewhere near correct then I don't think the social media cat hiking picture stories are helpful to people. Because it will lead people into believing that they are a failure in respect of cat caretaking.

Cat carries leash and harness to owner to ask to go for a walk

This cat really likes to go for a walk on a lead so much that she brings the harness and lead to her owner as a way of asking her to take her outside for a late night stroll. Unfortunately it was way too late because it was apparently 3 a.m. in the morning! What are they doing up at 3 a.m. in the morning? It doesn't matter, this is peak time for a domestic cat. 

Arya asks to go for a walk outside on a leash.

This is the middle of the day for this cat whose name is Arya. It's quite unusual for a cat to be leash trained effectively and obviously even more unusual for a cat to really like going for a walk on a leash.

The video is on the social media site TiKtoK where it has racked up 2.6 million views.

@aryathelittlecat

It’s 11pm I gotta sleep ##fyp ##catsoftiktok

♬ original sound - aryathelittlecat

A lot of viewers are sympathetic towards Arya. They seem to be saying that her owner should have gone out at 3 a.m.! Yeh, I agree. If you live with a domestic cat you have to do a night shift sometimes!

One problem with leash training is that the harness, which is quite thick, replicates the effect of a product called the Thundershirt. This is a calming vest. It sort of immobilises cats and thick harnesses can immobilise cats to the point where they simply lie on the ground or they wobble while walking. So when you leash train your cat you have to overcome this aspect of the process as well as encouraging them to walk along with you rather than stopping and sitting or doing precisely as they please.

All that said, it is great to see a cat being leash trained because it's a way of overcoming the dangers of taking a cat outside. I don't know where this was made. It looks like either the Middle East or Asia. I think I favour something like Indonesia or Malaysia, but I am speculating wildly. Ayra is a dilute brown tabby and white with very faint markings. She is a random bred cat. Her TiKToK page is called: aryathelittlecat.

Social media giants delete evidence of criminality

The story relates to extremists avoiding justice because the tech giants fail to archive social media posts of violence but I would like to extend that to animal abuse and cruelty which is so bad that it is a crime. I have bumped into examples of animal abuse on social media websites which is evidence for a potential successful prosecution under animal welfare statutes. It is not uncommon but the criminals are becoming more savvy.

Image in the public domain

A report by Human Rights Watch found that social media websites were removing violent imagery without preserving a copy which denies future prosecutors the chance to access vital evidence in potential future prosecutions.

Human Rights Watch's report is called Video Unavailable and it was published yesterday. They want social media websites to archive imagery which can be used as evidence. Social media website were indeed caught flat-footed when terrorist organisations promoted their objectives through video and still images. They social media sites reacted quite strongly partly because advertisers were distraught at the fact that their adverts were being associated with violence of the worst kind.

Algorithms perhaps driven by artificial intelligence nowadays are used to pick out these images and videos and delete them. I am a great fan of artificial intelligence but they need refining currently and they need rewriting to preserve evidence. I don't know whether these algorithms are written to detect animal abuse and animal cruelty images and videos. I would hope that they are. Apparently some algorithms are programmed to filter out posts and images before the content is published. This, too, is detrimental in terms of accruing evidence against criminals.

We all know, including the FBI in America, that animal cruelty is linked to a progression to violence against people. Therefore it is an important part of the criminal world and the investigation of serious crime.

Social media posts have helped to convicted war criminals. These posts have also helps human rights groups and investigative journalist to highlight abuse.

People Begin to Distrust Facebook

A YouGov poll discovered that Facebook is losing its credibility or more precisely local newspapers are three times more trusted for news than social media platforms such as Facebook.

Local newspapers are considered the most credible in terms of providing the news. Obviously it is regional news but local newspapers lead local television and radio and search engines in terms of trustworthiness.

Seventy-four percent (74%) of people trust the information that they read in their local newspaper both online and in print whereas 22% trust local news presented on social media platforms such as Facebook.

It appears that the stories about fake news has made Britons skeptical about the news that they read on Facebook. Fewer than a quarter of people trust social media in contrast to 61% who trust traditional media such as newspapers and television.

This is ironic because both Facebook and Google have taken a large slice of classified revenues relied upon by local and national newspapers. The press is becoming increasingly unsustainable and the UK government is reviewing the situation because closing 200 local papers over the past decade is a threat to democracy.

I hope that this poll helps drive people away from Facebook and back to a more trusted source, the local newspaper. How does this impact the world of cats? Well, there is a lot of cat news on Facebook. A lot of cat welfare happens on Facebook. I get some of my stories from Facebook. We need to be able to trust this dominant social media platform and it appears that currently we are unable to do so.

As an aside, I should say that when I'm writing articles about the domestic cat or wild cat species I ensure that my primary sources are books written by the best authors. In this way I'm able to go to the root source of information rather than relying upon second or third hand information which is often presented on the Internet. We always need to go back to basics.