photo by Scott Beale / Laughing Squid
Everybody knows that cats are evil little sociopaths who smuggle contraband into prisons and drive their owners to shoot each other right? So it should come as no surprise that there’s a group (or more specifically a guy) in New Zealand that wants to ban them outright. Actually, his logic is a bit less twisted. Cats are an invasive species in that country, and they eat a lot of native wildlife when they run amok. So he wants them off the island.
Cat owners are not amused.
Possibly, this has to do as much with his approach as his perspective. In addition to some practical suggestions that always get bad press, like keeping the cats indoors or top-fencing in the yard so they can’t escape, he says something about mass euthanasia. Actually, he says he doesn’t suggest that but isn’t opposed. His real meaning is clear. And we wonder which cat bit his toes every morning at 6AM to wake him up that he hates the species so much.
This is where things get hairy. People are very attached to their housepets. And whether they are invasive or not, cats aren’t the only threats to native populations. Dogs and stoats also pose problems, but this guy has got it in for the felines. (Why couldn’t he pick stoats? Few people love big weasels.)
And the bottom line is that he sounds like one of the crazies. It’s not like he’s got hoards of people backing him up. He’s on this demented one-man anti-cat campaign. Soon, the cats will be speaking back. “Ban the cats?” they say. “Far easier to ban this man.” Possibly Gareth Morgan should stop envisioning free kiwis (not the fruit, the bird) and start protecting his own back. Cats are, after all, stealthy and smart.
For all he knows, these wily hunters are gathering en masse and planning an eradication of their own. The meetings will start with a call to claws and end with symbolic shredding of Morgan’s picture in effigy. They will include the rarely-witnessed feline call to action. Yes, the cats of New Zealand are unlikely to take this napping in the sunny window. They are sure to approach the topic with claws outstretched and lion-teeth bared. Gareth Morgan, you may have met your match.
Photo by Scott Beale/Laughing Squid
Andrea
01/25/2013
I love my cat and if a man tried to kill him, I’d shoot that guy dead in the face. my cat is also an indoor cat. but most pets that go outdoors don’t actually disturb the natural wildlife that much because they get fed (hopefully) by their owners.
that said, overpopulation of feral cats is a huge problem everywhere because people don’t spay and neuter their pets and then feral cats reproduce like crazy. it feels awful but feral cats should be euthanized.
but then so should this dude. just saying.