The Way of Cats

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In some quarters, animal activism gets a bad rap. It’s derided as an expression of batty obsession, pointless sentimentality, or clueless extremeism.

But it’s not.

There’s no doubt that some organizations are neither pragmatic or sensible in how they go about reaching their goal. Like many animal activists, I agree with PETA in some principles, but their high-profile tactics often hurts the cause more than it helps. Their attitude that domestic pets are “slaves” is a ridiculous assertion, and when they act on this tenet of their philosophy, the results are animal cruelty in itself. And it seems they have serious hypocrisy issues:

Not counting the pets PETA spayed and neutered, the group put to death over 90 percent of the animals it took in during the last five years. Court records reveal the shocking truth about PETA.

Which is why I don’t support PETA.

Most animal activism is unsung everyday heroism, conducted under the radar of public notice. People volunteer at the local shelter, support environmental groups, and take action to report bad situations. When an animal issue does break out into the news, such as the Michael Vick dogfighting case, it can mobilize support.

It can also draw criticism.

It’s a cultural issue. Oh, please. Why do so many clearly cruel practices, towards either animals or humans, prompt this ridiculous excuse? All a “cultural practice” means is that a certain group of people has been doing a certain thing for a certain number of years. And that’s all it means.

For centuries, Romans had gladiatorial contests in which both humans and animals were pitted against each other in fights to the death. Should Italy bring this back as part of their heritage? The English used the same theaters that showed Shakespeare plays to have animals kill each other for sport. Should we still do it, and defend the practice as part of the British theatrical tradition? In the United States, it’s legal to declaw cats, even though all these countries have banned the practice as being extremely inhumane. Maybe we should get a clue.

This is really a small crime. Certainly, that’s the attitude reflected in current law, where animal abuse is often a misdemeanor with relatively small fines. A recent case in Ohio involved a man who got revenge on the girlfriend who broke up with him by nailing her parakeets to the wall of her home. That’s a $200 fine. If this same man, in the same state, had been caught littering that’s a fine up to $500 and 60 days in jail. Come on. Which criminal is more dangerous?

It’s silly to be upset about animals when people are suffering. I find this criticism to be completely inexplicable. Since when is compassion either/or? We should cancel all school lunch programs designed to make sure kids get a daily good meal until there are no more neglected orphans anywhere?

This argument might have some teeth if the person using it actually was working tirelessly on the behalf of some suffering humans, somewhere. However, people who actually do relief work, strangely enough, support all relief work. Are we going to drop all the organizations struggling for recognition and treatment of a particular disease into a pit, let them fight over which disease is the absolute worst, and only give money to the winner?

We recognize that would be stupid. It would cause suffering, not alleviate it. When someone disparages humane treatment of animals, it prompts the question in my own mind: Where is this person drawing the line? That line has moved in deadly ways to exclude certain people at certain times, always with terrible results. Which is why I draw a hell of big circle in my own life, and feel compassion for any beings with the capacity to feel.

That’s what empathy is. Humane isn’t about the object of our compassion. Humane says something about the being who is extending the compassion. Or not.

This philosophy informs my political decisions as well. One often has to do some research to see if a particular candidate has even gone to the trouble of making a stand on this issue. But since I completely agree with the psychological assertion that animal cruelty leads to human cruelty, I think it’s an important indicator of their character.

Sometimes, a candidate does take a stand on this issue that is easy to discover. (If you click on the video, be aware that it shows images and concepts that are extremely upsetting. And rightly so.)

If you feel strongly about this issue, donate here.

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There’s more to The Way of Cats than the article you are reading now. See my LATEST CAT ADVICE.

A while back I added a new page, called I Might Speak Your Language.

It offers online, real time translation of the blog into many different languages.

Show me this page.

I hope this will be of service to some of my readers. If you have a friend who might be able to use this feature, let them know!

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Because kitties speak a universal language.

Got here from a Link or Search?
There’s more to The Way of Cats than the article you are reading now. See my LATEST CAT ADVICE.

The Humane Society has a fund for disaster relief, and they’ve been helping the littlest flood victims.

Help here.

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Got here from a Link or Search?
There’s more ways to get our cat to be affectionate in The Way of Cats than the article you are reading now. See all of my CAT AFFECTION posts.