The notorious JD Vance derogatory comment on ‘childless cat ladies’ has reverberated around the American political landscape and come back to bite him on the bum and on Trump’s copious bum too 😉🤣. Vance screwed up bigtime when he criticised childless cat ladies for liking cats and not creating families. Vance is a [bad] Christian and he likes big families. He believes that Americans should be procreating. He wouldn’t be so keen if there were 2 billion Americans living in the country which may well happen one day, mark my words. All that stupendous American landscape, the magnificent forests and clean air will be gone; concreted over. But that is another topic.
In the meantime, Oprah Winfrey received a roar of approval at a campaign gathering when indirectly taking a swipe at Vance in her speech about that horrible comment. The segment is in the video below. Note: this is an embedded video and it may stop working in due course. Sorry if that has happened but I can’t control the existence of embedded videos.
He comment brings to my mind an unerring fact of human life which is uncomfortable to relate: in a house fire, almost invariably, the human escapes while the cats do not. They are left behind.
In truth Oprah Winfrey’s statement – wise and so right – is wrong on one respect: domestic cats often die in house fires. The reasons go beyond the cat’s lower status than the human in terms of life value. A major problem I am sure is that cats are great at hiding when they are frightened.
The home owner will be unable to find them when her home goes up in smoke. And so, they are likely to die of smoke inhalation in their secret hiding place. That said the owner should know where those places are likely to be and search there first.
I think all cat caregivers should have a well-thought through plan which deals with escaping their home WITH THEIR CATS in the event of a house fire. They should be prepared for the event.
And in multi-cat homes there is an argument that a sprinkler system should be installed! Highly unlikely but in would save feline lives. I’d certainly advocate for a sprinkler system if the home owner runs a cat rescue service from her/his home which does happen even if it might be against the rules of the local authority.
More: Cat caregiving obligation. In multi-cat homes prepare for a house fire.
P.S. please forgive the occasional typo. These articles are written at breakneck speed using Dragon Dictate. I have to prepare them in around 20 mins. Also: sources for news articles are carefully selected but the news is often not independently verified. Also, I rely on scientific studies but they are not 100% reliable.
