Cat Meows Underwater Video Critique
For anyone is who has sensibilities towards animal welfare, this video of a cat meowing under water has to be upsetting. Firstly, the cat is not actually meowing under water. He or she has her mouth slightly under water so the meow sounds interesting to the sort of blockheads who like funny cat videos at the expense of an unhappy cat.
Here are a couple of stills from the video in case it is removed from YouTube (note: I have cleaned up the colour in these stills):
cat meowing under water
The still images actually help focus the mind because one can only come to one conclusion: the cat is unhappy. Also, this cat looks confused and frightened to me.
The cat’s owner says:
“[the cat] does not like the bathtub…”
That would seem to be an admission that he put the cat in the bathtub. Or his partner did. That is not a good start. Here’s the video:
VIDEO NO LONGER WORKS – SORRY.
This cat is very static, indeed. She looks as though she has been washed all over as her head and ears are wet. Perhaps she was dirty and the owner has cleaned her and then decided to video her looking miserable. I think that is about the kindest assessment I can make.
Her static stance is worrying. It can only be due to fear, confusion or intimidation. My guess is that fear or anxiety coupled with confusion are the main emotions.
And for a cat to let her mouth fall slightly below the water line is also very strange. That supports the confusion theory, for me.
The cat’s owner laughs at his cat while he is videoing. To be frank, he sounds a bit idiotic to me but I am a bit of a grumpy old geezer.
Conclusion
YouTube lets video makers put a description under their video. There is no description for this video, which indicates some guilt. What I mean is there was probably no good reason for putting this cat in the water other than to film her being anxious and to see what happened.
However, to be as fair and as objective as possible, putting a cat in a water-filled bathtub when she hates the bathtub is not necessarily nasty behavior because the cat might need to be washed for a good reason. One reason might be that she had a chemical on her fur, which couldn’t be licked off by the cat because it would poison her.
However, to film her after washing her (if that was the case), leaving her in the water looking confused and miserable and even possibly swallowing some water is once again an abuse of a cat for financial gain for the cat’s owner.
This video has acquired 2.5m views. It would have made some money for the video maker. How much? At a wild guess about $50+ a month. Small stuff but still money made at the expense of a cat.
When your cat is fairly obviously distressed, you don’t grab the camcorder and film her. You make her feel better as soon as possible, don’t you?