Legislation to Ban Cat Declawing Introduced by Assemblywoman

Legislation to Ban Cat Declawing Introduced by Assemblywoman

Please click on the above link and then spread the word. If this bill succeeds it'll mean that declawing is banned in NY state and that means a massive step in the right direction. It will be the first state where it has been banned. Thank you.

Timeline of the Cat

Timeline of the Cat | PoC

This is a cross-post (please click on the link above). I have written up a fairly comprehensive cat timeline with the major events. I have been selective as you have to be because there is too much.

The timeline goes from the first cats on the planet to the present day. All the action that we know or are concerned about in relation to the cat is compressed into the last 100 years.

But the timeline starts up to 20 million years ago. We are not that interested in what happened 20 million years ago but it does make the timeline complete and provides a nice counterpoint to the modern events.

Domineering Men Do Not like Cats

Dominating men do not like cats because the cat is free and will never consent to become a slave.  He will do nothing to your order, as the other animals do.  The words are those of Jean-Jacques Rousseau.

James Boswell. He wrote a famous biography of Samuel Johnson

He was making a clever observation about James Boswell.  James Boswell was the servant of Samuel Johnson.  Samuel Johnson, as you probably know, loved cats and he looked after a series of cats the most famous of which was “Hodge".

Hodge

James Boswell admits that he suffered from Jonson's intimacy with his cat Hodge because he was an ailurophobe -  he had a fear of cats and therefore became uneasy if a cat was in the same room as himself.

Samuel Johnson would personally go out to buy food for his cat Hodge (as reported by James Boswell).  He would do this because he did not want his servant (companion and Samuel's biographer) to feel imposed upon and end up disliking his cat.

So what about the idea that domineering men do not like cats?  Well, I think the observation has to be correct.  In the past I have talked about the alpha male human and his preference for dogs as a leader of a pack of dogs. As the domestic cat is an independent creature and has no hardwired innate necessity to be part of a pack he/she will normally reject any attempt to be dominated by a human caretaker.

If a human caretaker tries to dominate his domestic cat he will simply alienate him/her.  It will end up in tears and a failure.  So let's agree that Mr Russeau is correct.

UK - Don't Buy a Pet On Gumtree

The story concerns a dog, Kai, and I am sure that a lot of people have read about this.  The dog was left abandoned on a railway station with all the bits and pieces that a person needs to look after the dog in a suitcase.  It was the classic Paddington Bear scenario.  There was uproar as to how somebody could leave a dog on a railway station, so cruelly abandoned and the abandonment was highlighted by all the accoutrements the person needed to look after the dog being left on the railway station as well.

As it turns out, the story isn't a simple case of the abandonment of a domestic animal.  I believe that we can lay the blame for this act of apparent domestic animal cruelty at the feet of a commercial organisation: Gumtree.  Gumtree is a bit like Craigslist in America.  It is the American version of it.  Anybody can sell anything on Gumtree.

In this instance we discovered that a lady, Fin Rayner, had left the dog at Ayr railway station, Scotland.  What happened was she had responded to an advert for the dog on the Gumtree website; the dog had been advertised for £400.  The dog is a cross breed shar pei.

'I went to buy a dog but the dog was not the same as the picture advertised.'

When she met the seller, a man, she realised that the dog was not the same animal that she had seen advertised on Gumtree and, in addition, she noted there was a problem with the dog's eyes (probably a breeding problem). She became suspicious and, in response, the seller asked for a deposit of £150 if she wanted to take the dog for a walk.  She appears to have done that but she hadn't got far before the man disappeared with her money.

Things got worse because the dog was clearly nervous and unsettled as he was peeing everywhere.  The lady felt she had not bought the dog and having tried to call the seller to return to collect his pet without success she decided to get on the next train to Glasgow and before doing so she told a member of staff at the station that the dog belonged to somebody else. She abandoned the dog.

She said: 'He lied about the dog. I can't believe he did this....I've been shaken for days....I don't think people should sell dogs on Gumtree.'

The moral of the story is that you should not buy a dog on the Gumtree website despite the fact that there are many cats and dogs and other pets on that site.  You simply cannot be sure what you are buying.  There is not only a problem in respect of the buyer but also the animal.  Many buyers will also be unscrupulous leaving the animals exposed to abuse having been sold on perhaps for animal research or perhaps dog fight baiting.

Of course, not all sales of domestic animals on Gumtree go wrong but the whole process is simply unethical and liable to go wrong and I'm thinking of the animals more than the people.  It is disrespectful to advertise them online.

The reason why the seller wanted rid of his dog is because he/she had an eye problem requiring surgery, the price of which was £1,000. He could not afford it. A vet did the surgery for free probably organised by the Scottish SPCA.

Justin Bieber's Fake Penis

Forgive me for the title and that there isn't a cat in sight.  It is just that this is so modern. The fakery.

Apologies for the rude title but it is honest.

It is isn't just fake muscles and fake chest and whatever else has to be fake in a fake world. Bieber has to make his penis look bigger in his underpants.

Big deal. I don't know whether he agreed to this Photoshopping. He should have vetoed it. He should have asked questions. He seems to have let his "advisers" take charge and make him look silly, to be candid.

When this sort of fakery dominates the online media there is little chance for people to comprehend the reality of the current situation regarding the plight of the wild cat species. Their conservation is failing but few people have registered that.

Whoops....I have mentioned a cat.