Online invitations to adopt a 40.3-pound grossly obese cat went viral. Good or bad?

NEWS AND COMMENT: I think that it is worthwhile discussing this story from the point of view of ethics. Something which perhaps would not occur to most people but I think it’s a valuable discussion in this instance.

Here we have a grossly obese and large domestic cat that found himself at the Richmond Animal Care and Control shelter after being surrendered on 4th April 2023. They posted an adoption advert on Wednesday morning.

And what is perhaps interesting and at the same time disappointing for me is that there was a huge amount of competition between the applicants to adopt him. They all wanted to get their hands on him.

Why was that? Why would somebody want to adopt a cat that was so obese? Obesity is meant to be unattractive. It certainly is when it applies to people. But apparently cats are different.

The cat’s name is Patches. You see, I don’t think it is good for people to almost worship a cat who is clearly very unhealthy because of very poor cat caregiving.

I don’t think it’s a good idea to desire such a cat with such passion because you are indirectly accepting the backstory which is that somebody overfed this cat for a very long time which is negligent cat caregiving. Some might argue it’s a crime to overfeed a cat this much. It is certainly very near a crime. If you worship a cat like this you are indirectly condoning this marginal criminality.

But it is a reflection of the kind of cat picture and topic which does go viral on the Internet. My belief is that so many people wanted to adopt him because they wanted to get into the news themselves. They wanted to have their 15 minutes of fame because fame was beckoning for Patches. And it worked. There are in the New York Post.

His weight is 6 pounds 15.25 ounces below the all-time world record for a domestic cat (Himmy at 46 lbs 15.25 oz). Yes, Patches is very near a world record so he is exceptional. And people will always go for the exceptional and the rare. It doesn’t matter whether the back story is ugly.

And apparently, it doesn’t matter that they’re going to have to have a very long and difficult time pulling his weight down to a more reasonable number. He is a very big cat anyway so I expect he would weigh up to 20 pounds even with the right BMI.

The woman who finally succeeded in adopting him, Kay Ford, said:

I knew that there were going to be 9 billion people who were falling in love with him at the same time”.

Yes, 9 billion people fell in love with him. Why do people fall in love with a 40-pound cat? We don’t fall in love with a 25 stone man or woman who is twice their normal weight.

I don’t want to be too picky but isn’t this unfair on cats? Isn’t it a form of speciesism? Is it plain wrong?

Kay Ford lives quite close to the shelter which may have been one reason why she succeeded in adopting him.

She is also retired and therefore at home a lot. Good luck to her. She will have to reduced Patches’ weight very slowly in order to avoid hepatic lipidosis a.k.a. fatty liver disease. If you semi-starve a cat it damages the liver. It should be slow and controlled. Will she love him as much when he is a normal weight?

Conclusion: the underlying reason why so many people wanted to adopt Patches is because at the end of the day he became a prized possession. A reflection of the relationship between humans and animals all too often. Social media has distorted the relationship. There is no question in my mind about this. Instagram is full of videos and pictures of people and their cats with the goal of achieving some sort of recognition at least and fame at best. Even some money at the end of it through advertising. This is commercialising cats.

But you got to start off with an interesting cat. A cat that stands out. A cat that is obviously different. And Patches is ideal because he looks extraordinary and the owner can spend the next 12 months reducing his weight which can all be documented in a series of photographs and videos on Instagram. A great vehicle for the person looking to attract thousands of social media followers.

Remember the vets constantly remind us that there is a feline obesity epidemic. We don’t seem to be embarrassed by this or mind.