For visitors who haven’t bumped into the Julianne Westberry saga: she is a cat rescue woman who ended up being a cat hoarder leading to the deaths, through neglect and other reasons, of countless cats. Her story on PoC.
These are some selected quotes and saying from Julianne Westberry’s Facebook page. Why am I publishing them here? To try and get an insight into the way she thinks. There is a bit of God fearing stuff on her FB page together with “self-help sayings”. She is religious and believes in God Almighty. Surprise you?
Westberry presents and entirely normal face to the world on FB. It is all lovey-dovey, I am good, doing good work and being admired by her band of followers. There is a blandness about it all. Nothing to give a hint at what was happening behind closed doors.
The last Facebook post by Julianne Westberry (at the time of writing this) is June 18th 2014. Up until then she posted more than once daily on FB.
Except for two supporters, no one has made a comments since June 18th. It seems the June 18th post refers to her exposure as a cruel cat hoarder. This wasn’t cat rescue. It was cat cruelty with a bit of rescue thrown in.
June 18th:
“It is during our darkest moments that we must focus to see the light.”
Martha Gomez: We are pulling for girl !!
Gini Agnew: Keep that thought girl….we love you and want you back…big hugs and lots of loving thoughts!
Also posted 18th June:
17th June
“Love All, Serve All”
As a believer in Jesus Christ, you are His child. You may not always act the way He wants you to, but you never stop being His child. God will never give up on us!
June 16th
“It was my mother who taught me the love of God.” “I know it isn’t politically correct to talk about God these days, but …oh well, they gave me a microphone.” ~Tyler Perry
April 12th
Jer. 29:11 – For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.
March 30th via Amazon:
Food is needed most, and cleaning supplies of course, and this time of year Anything for nursing moms and babies.
March 27th:
My conclusion? I hate to say it but I believe her belief is God and Christianity supported her callous behavior towards cats. She did not have a sensitivity towards them. That lack of sensitivity appears to be due to a belief that they are “only cats” – lesser creatures as promoted by the Bible. Westberry lives in the US bible belt. Wrong? Now you can criticise me if you wish.
I don’t care what kind of appearance she put forth to those around her and do not care whether she is considered a Christian or not. I do believe she is mean and evil. You have to be, to let an innocent animal starve to death. The thought of all the suffering she caused makes me sick.
Well i dont know what to say exactly, I feel shocked as she appeared on the outside like there was no worry’s, although i dont know the women personally.Just on her Facebook page as i looked too. I couldn’t believe it. Its like nothing else happened. I still just cant believe what has really happened to those innocent animals. Its no excuse to put that Cats are just Cats. I was bought up in a Christian Home and we sure didn’t believe like that.
Remember the Rainbow Ark incident:
https://pictures-of-cats.org/uk-saving-animals-can-be-too-hard-for-one-person.html
Paula is a devout Christian too!
I haven’t written any update on this because the case is still ongoing, she fooled a lot of people too and she and her supporters are still pleading innocence even though the proof of the neglect was seen in many of the animals at the Sanctuary.
All were relocated to other Rescues all over the country, paid for by the donations.
Some were in a dreadful state, some have died or had to be PTS!
I always thought religious people would be kind to animals, but it seems you are right Michael, some are not. I don’t think anyone should criticise what you say because the truth is there, believers in God should not abuse His animals.
I wonder if some “Christians” simply use that label as a way of looking good in the eyes of others. Westberry can’t be a genuine Christian. Genuine Christians help others. She professed to help others e.g. cats but it was an illusion and self-deception.
No wondering about it. Politicians do the same thing in their fund raising efforts and support gathering. Just as ugly.
Michael I think you are right about the treating animals as objects for mankind which is often the message coming from the bible and christianity. I don’t however believe that this is what activates the bad behaviour, I think this is what allows a person behaving badly (or about to) to continue when questioned. Usually people select things they want to be the case. If you are doing something and you question yourself about it then it’s because you aren’t sure about it, but often if you like what you are doing, it becomes about selecting the thoughts that can be used to rationalize the behaviour, allowing you to continue behaving like that.
I don’t think it’s so active in her mind. I think people who do terrible things will do it regardless of what their religion is. Christianity is just perfectly designed to enable bad behaviour (a christian will say ‘god and jesus accept your terrible deeds as necessary experiences from which you learn to grow wiser as you negotiate the path to righteousness and heaven) because it’s so malleable, it can be used to justify so many things that are morally wrong. The irony is a huge gaping chasm which I can’t even grasp.
The picture she creates of herself is so far removed from her own picture. So far that the irony and paradox is extreme. A good christian lady rescuing cats is what she wants people to see, but in reality that’s just a facade I guess. She could have chosen any religion. The truth is that she is a bad woman who either uses religion as a cover or can’t think for herself. The 2 are different though. If the latter then it really would be because of christianity, I mean if she embraced that early on to cope with life as her way of thinking. But if it’s the former, then it’s what I said before, less the fault of christianity and more her own thinking.
The problem with christianity or any religion is that when somebody claims to represent it we assume they are working hard on being good and anyway it’s politically incorrect to question religions. Alot of assuming goes on which obstructs our view of them. In our subcontious deep down we trust the journeys that some people take, to follow god or jesus who’s values are good enough that we are less careful around them when infact the truth of who they are is the opposite.
It’s obvious when you think about it. IF a person advertizes that they believe in god and they promote his ideas of forgiveness and goodness towards others it IS for a reason. The obvious reason will be that they were brought up as such, in which case they know nothing else and would be afraid to change to the unknown. The other obvious reason for a conversion is because of a catastrophe of event which causes you to crave the message of jesus and it helps you to move forward. Here’s the thing, somebody who’s bad event involved them being bad will want forgiveness from god and jesus, which they apparently have plenty of. There’s a pattern I notice in my life and this story fits in perfectly. It’s the simple fact that, for example, if you meet somebody who makes it known to you that they are really nice and they go out their way to be kind, then you know the exact opposite exists behind close doors (for now) and if anything the view you are getting of them is their balancing act. The nice person is actually capable of being more of a dickhead than most people who are just norma;l when you meet them. Either he is trying to hide it or he is really trying to be nice.
Which was Julianne doing?
Was she ‘trying to solve it, trying to stop being bad to cats, trying to stop her compulsive behaviour? Does she want the cats to be ok and are her ideals actually good? Is she trying to be a better person by turning to god and jesus? Good intentions pave the road to hell as they say, and I understand that in a new way each time I think of it.
OR, does she like watching cats suffer and does she know that what she is doing is bad to others but she herself likes it or doesn’t feel bad about it. Her definition of ‘good’ being fit for an asylum basically. Does she use jesus as a cover for her true self which is a danger to others and probably herself. In one way this is worse, because she likes it, but in another the fact she likes it means she is clinically insane, or sociopathic – which makes it hard to hold it against her because she might be rehabilitated and then what? We tell her to piss off? Hard call.
I’m not sure which I find worse, or if it’s either. But there is something screaming at me from this story like nothing else. Simply it’s that nobody saw it, nobody knew and everybody thought the opposite of her. This is a key to the story in my opinion. Even on hindsight. Weird.
A person who is pretending to be nice, but actually like torturing cats and doesn’t feel love for them, would be easy to spot soon enough, over time. If you saw her with a cat you would know right away if she connected with it and loved it. You might not catch it once or twice, but over time, in the cat community, surely you would see that she doesn’t have the same love for the cats. This suggests that outwardly and to the community she was a true cat lover, not something you can fake.
Yet what happened at home smacks of torture. What is going on inside her is probably like torture as well. But why the huge split and disconnect between the two. How did this happen? How can one person be capable of so much and such opposites?
Sounds to me alot like alot borderline split personality disorder, which she managed to keep just in check. A schizophrenic proper would’t be able to hide it I don’t think. Usually these people have 2 or sometimes many characters, and the fundemental theme which separates them is moral and emotional. One is good and one is evil.
Well it’s not suprising everybody feels like they were duped if I am right, because what they saw really was a good person. They just didn’t see the bad person. So nobody should feel like they missed something or made a mistake. Nobody could have done it differently.
That’s where my theory is at now based on the god and jesus thing along with her need to churn out haiku christian sayings about forgiveness. Where you have forgiveness, you must therefore have something that needed forgiving. It’s actually amazingly simple. If she is schizophrenic she may not even remember parts of it. But I don’t think that she is. I think she is clinically borderline schizophrenic with sociopathic tendencies. Not enough to be unable to function, but almost. I mean, she is dysfunctional, but sadly probably not enough to be diagnosed and treated. But that has changed because people know now, so her dysfunction is out and that gap, the split, now has a bridge accross it, or it always did but was’t very strong clearly.
That’s my two 🙂
Red article will come, but it’s not ready yet.
Agreed. You have refined my thought substantially. I do feel though that Christianity does both, namely what you say and it also underpins (for some people) an attitude which is a breeding ground for abuse of animals.
The story almost reflects all that is wrong with our relationship with animals and our desperate need to be liked at all costs – to be an insider, to be part of the group. That helps with survival. People overlook bad behavior in order to remain an insider.
The truth is humans have a terrible relationship with animals in general – look at the cruelty and mass gradual extinctions of wild species and exploitations (African elephant ivory) – and we are barely able to survive. We struggle at every level. So taking the high moral road is beyond many people. It is too demanding. We live in the primeval soup 😉 I have been a bit negative. This story makes me negative about humankind.
In hindsight,the quotes,to me,are a cry for help from a very disturbed person.In some twisted way it almost seems she was asking to be forgiven for the cruelty she had committed. Just a thought. I’m not excusing the horror and senseless death.Heartbreaking,just heartbreaking. May all these feline souls be at peace.
You could be right. For me it is more a deluded person believing she is Christian and god fearing in her behavior is in fact the opposite almost. Or it is a deliberate and cynical smoke screen.