This is a poll created specially for PoC by Meetville, a dating site. The questions where mine. It was held from 10/20/14 to 11/13/14 among 9,454 people from the following countries:
- USA – 49%
- Canada – 6%
- Britain – 15%
- Australia – 6%
- Other countries – 24%.
It is a large poll which makes it more accurate. However, slightly unfortunately, the results are, in my opinion, muddied slightly because people in countries other than the two where declawing happens (USA and Canada), took part.
Despite that slight blurring in precision, the results should shock people who are concerned about cat welfare. If you are not at least surprised by the results I don’t believe you care enough. Yet, in each case around 50% of the poll participants don’t appear to care enough about cat welfare.
Clearly an underlying cause is a lack of knowledge about the declawing operation…
Once again I am staggered at the high percentage of people who are still in the dark about declawing. To remind people, it is not just removing the claw. It is removing the bone to which the claw is attached together with the claw. The bone is the distal phalanx. Often (in Utah, USA about 60% of the time) the bone is shattered leaving shards in the toe. This hurts and can cause lameness. The Paw Project carry out repair surgery to remove these shards. There are other issues such as nail regrowth under the skin causing abscesses. It is horrible and quite different to what many people perceive the operation to be.
This misconception about declawing must be the major reason why such a high percentage of people state that declawing is not cruel…
I have to take a deep breath before looking at these figures.
Another poll question does not concern declawing but relinquishment (abandonment) of one’s cat. I am almost equally shocked at this statistic…
To restate what the poll tells us: 37% of people (almost 4 in 10) would give up their cat even if they have the ability to care for him/her. If this is accurate, it tells me that a lot of cat caretakers are “cat owners” and are not really connected with their cat. There is not the desired level of care and love towards their cat which I feel is required to do a good job of looking after a cat companion.
Michael, spot on! That’s exactly what meant 🙂 You are brilliant 🙂
Nice point Natalie. I think what you are saying is that we are writing for ourselves and we already know the situation. The poorer caretakers don’t tend to visit sites such as this one. Also the mainstream media which is seen by the poorer cat owner often misrepresents things and promote the cat as an object.
For me the results indicate that a lot of work is still to be done and better ways of delivering the message to be found. It should be happening on many fronts. The messages should be orientated on that significant number of cat owners who don’t read “special” cat resources (i.e. they just watch what’s going on TV, etc). xox
That’s why I would support compulsory microchipping for cats and dogs. The registration could act similar to a vehicle log book, in that all vet visits, treatments etc. would be recorded. As would any transfer of ownership. That way if an animal is abused or neglected, the authorities know who is legally responsible for the welfare of that creature. Prosecutions of cruelty, abandonment etc., should then be stepped up to reinforce the responsiblities of pet ownership.