I love cat declawing and celebrate the day it was invented: Jan 21st 1951. Declawing a cat improves the cat, I say. You get to keep all the goodness of the cat while getting rid of the bad bits. God created the world and everything in it but sometimes he screwed up a teeny-weeny bit; he gave cats claws.
I fly the flag of the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) from the front porch every year on that special day and open a bottle of the best French Champagne. I have the first glass just after I’ve cleared my cat’s faeces from the back room carpet.
I am told from the best authority that the very first declaw was carried out by Dr. Charles Muggleford, a Midwestern, god-fearing vet of the old school. He had just married for the 6th time. No matter how hard he worked and how much he charged his long-suffering clientele he was always broke. The alimony payments were emptying his pockets every day. He’d put 30 kids through university – god, the expense. He had to do something, anything and, in a timely manner, along came Mrs Betty A. Higginbottom with her loyal and vocal Siamese, “Pussy”.
She told the good doctor that she had had a long and fruitful conversation with her Pussy. She’d told him, she couldn’t put up with the damage he caused to her beautiful, brilliant white sofa. She’d screamed at him, “I can’t take anymore of this, your claws have to go”. She knew Pussy agreed with her because he slinked away looking guilty as if to say, “I know I’m a bad boy. I deserve to be punished”.
Anyway, “Higgy” (as Higginbottom was affectionately called) and her Pussy got their way. The good doc whipped off those claws. Of course, being the first attempt at it, he screwed up. He was bound too. Surgery wasn’t his forté anyway. He left bits of bone in and failed to realise that claws can sometimes regrow causing great discomfort. You can’t blame him as he was a great pioneer in the art of declawing. You know, there is a heavy bronze statue of him somewhere, I forget where. He’s standing tall, gazing at the sky, proudly erect, holding a scalpel with a cowering cat at his feet.
Higgy was delighted with the result of the declawing op. but Pussy wasn’t. Pussy has never got used to cat litter since and prefers soft carpet to Higgy’s annoyance.
No matter, Higgy saved her white sofa from “complete destruction”. She had saved her hands from being “clawed to bits”. She knew for certain that she risked death or the loss of her arm if she was clawed by Pussy because of the nasty bacteria on the claws.
Today in 2014, cat declawing is a wonderful business for 99% of veterinarians. It is their bread-and-butter business or strawberry-jam-and-tomato-sauce judging by the amount of blood that is left on the cage walls after the op. LOL.
Declawing cats is a win-win situation. The vets get a good income from it (billions of dollars annually) and cat owners get a cat that is purrrfect for indoor living – a sweet furrrrball. I don’t understand why people object to it. All the talk about complications and people getting rid of their declawed cat because of behavioral problems are lies, damn lies. It is propaganda from those crazy AR nuts who want to make us pro-declawers feel guilty.
How can it be cruel to remove the nails of a cat? All the vet is doing is removing that nasty sharp bit at the end of the toe. It is not much worse than cutting your nails.
Look, we have to trust our veterinarians. They know best. If they tell us our cat will be as right-as-rain after the operation that is good enough for me. Don’t forget, every vet swears the veterinarian’s oath when they qualify. They raise their right hand and place their left hand on the AVMA bible and swear that they will always do the right thing and dedicate the remainder of their lives to improving the health and welfare of the cat and all animals. If smart people swear that I feel super-confident that they will never needlessly harm our cats. Don’t you believe that? Come on, they are vets, pillars of American society.
Original photo by Beverly & Pack
I would loooove to cut every declawing vets fingers off first nuckle up and and see how well they do
Me too. Thanks Lilly.
Why would anybody joke about this stuff? Declawing is NOT a joke, sadly its done to thousands of poor innocent cats a year. I do get that this is a joke though, but still it makes me sad.
This site has about 200+ pages on declawing and it was time for a new approach because the usual approaches were not having much effect. It is meant to highlight the poor thinking behind declawing. To shine a light on the crass human behavior behind this disgusting operation.
Thanks for commenting and supporting the fight against declawing.
Good article 🙂 You had me fooled for a moment, well more than a moment, until I got past the title.
A clever way to get the message across.
Hi Larry, I hope that you’re okay. Thanks for visiting and commenting. Yes, this is a rather strange article that I wrote but I do try, as you might know, to address things from a different angle because when we write about things from the same angle every time people become inured to it and nothing changes. And when I do these articles I like to make them look almost real with the intention of making people think and ask questions. That, in any case, is the intention. I keep trying, and I always will, to stop declawing because I hate it so much that it motivates me to fight against it permanently.
He was in my lap asleep and I woke him up just to take his picture. Didn’t do that again. He looked so mad…
aww furby looked sooo cute