Scenario: This is about the impossibility of an ailurophile living with an ailurophobe! Man gets good job and wants to buy a house. His brother will live with him. Both hate cats. His girlfriend loves cats and has 2. He tells her that she will have to give the cats to a shelter if she wants to live with him and his brother in his house. She rejects the idea (of course). They agree that she can keep them in one room (thought: impossible and cruel in my view). Brother appears to object to that. Negotiations continuing!
AITA: in Reddit language this means ‘Am I the asshole?’
YTA: means ‘You’re the asshole’.
This was a man posting on the Reddit group called AM I THE ASSHOLE?!?
Most responders/commenters said that he was an asshole for making his demands.
It is obvious that he is. I agree with the others. To simply make the demands and no more is enough for the woman to reject the man and dump him I’d say. He actually thinks that his girlfriend could abandon her cats to a shelter to have the pleasure of living with him! The arrogance and insensitivity is shocking.
The man is too arrogant and insensitive to be worthy of being her boyfriend. And the brother is a problem because he is a third party who is getting in the way of the relationship which appears doomed because of the cats. He says that he and his brother are a package so they won’t split.
How often has this happened before and will happen again? At its core, the problem is about men’s preference for dogs and women’s preference for cats as animal companions.
He thinks cats are destructive. “We think they’re messy, destructive and annoying”. I wonder how messy, destructive and annoying he is! He is certainly annoying to his girlfriend who said that she’d rather be homeless than give up her cats to a shelter.
“She’s also called me an asshole for even asking her to give up the cats in the first place.”
She is right to do this in my opinion. She has a medical condition called POTS an autoimmune condition.
Here is a representative response:
“1st YTA for buying a house with your brother…. If you believe your future is with this gf. Will she ever feel like it is her home as well if your brother is telling her what she can and cannot do?
2nd. Just like you and she is a package deal. So, it is the same with her and her cats.
3rd I get she has a medical reasons but until she decides to re-home the cats you cannot pressure her.”
Conclusion: a relationship between man and woman cannot work if at the outset the man starts dictating terms and conditions on whether she can or cannot have cats in the conjugal home when she loves cats. This is because when a person loves cats and has cats the relationship is as strong as that between man and woman. You can’t break it up.
A cat caregiving woman can only successfully live with a man who loves, likes or at the very least tolerates cats with good grace.
It is the stability of the cat-human relationship which is so great
11,000-year-old close relationship between a human and a cat
How often has this happened before and will happen again? At its core, the problem is about men’s preference for dogs and women’s preference for cats as animal companions…
But is this really true? What’re the percentages?
Sort of correct. It is also about man’s arrogance in thinking they can dictate terms like this which are wholly unacceptable.
I mean what evidence is there men and boys tend to dislike cats more than women and girls?
The evidence is everywhere. It is also in the character of the human male compared to the female character. In general, the male human is more in tune with the dog and the woman more in tune with the cat.
I strongly disagree. I think this is more of an assumption and rather a sexist one at that! Even seen no evidence of it myself. Also, the fact that maybe – in some countries – more women own cats, may be partly due to single mothers wanting animals safe for their babies and little children.
“While pups are top dog in US households, one third (35%) of Americans own a cat. As with dogs, men (37%) are more likely to own a feline friend than women (33%), with ownership peaking among Millennials (46%).7 Sept 2016” So, whilst it is true that about 70% of US men own a dog, they are also more likely to own a cat than women, not less so…
Dogs are also often used for the protection of property, particularly in the USA, more so than women having them to help protect them. Men also tend to generally be more macho and misogynistic in America and associate aggressive dogs with this.
Furthermore, in the UK, almost as many people own a cat as a dog. Indeed, in Germany, far more people own cats than dogs
FYI – I updated the phenol page: https://pictures-of-cats.org/phenol-in-household-products-are-highly-toxic-to-domestic-cats.html
What sort of future does the woman have marrying two men like that. (It’s obvious that she’ll be married to both.) She needs to run far away from that love triangle ASAP. If she complies to today’s demand, what new demands will they inforce on her tomorrow? There are too many wonderful men in the world that would love to have her and her cats. She needs to find one of them.
Dogs can be aggressive and dangerous, but dictating to a partner not to have cats in the home, or sectioned off, is pretty insensitive and unnecessary unless they were highly allergic.