One bad thing about having Google News alerts for cat-related stories is the sheer, sickening volume of articles about cats who are maimed, tortured, killed by vigilante lunatics, dispatched by overzealous birders, shot with BB guns or arrows, poisoned with antifreeze, murdered as proxies in domestic violence incidents, kicked like soccer balls by juvenile psychopaths, or tragically killed by someone’s epic stupidity.
The amount of violence directed at felines is mind-boggling, and it doesn’t reflect well on the US: For example in Istanbul, a city of more than 15 million people, there are some 130,000 cats living on the streets, not including pets. While many ‘Mericans see an animal and think “Let’s shoot it!” the people of Turkey are overwhelmingly compassionate, going to incredible lengths to make sure street cats are fed, watered, sheltered and have access to veterinary care.
Today’s story fits in the “vigilante lunatics” category.
It’s not clear if the person in question simply hates cats or is acting out of some misguided campaign to “protect” small wildlife, but we do know that a would-be cat killer is threatening to kill outdoor kitties in Joplin, Missouri, a city about 230 miles east of Oklahoma City.
The suspect slapped warning letters and posters on the front doors of homes along four separate streets between 2:40 and 5 a.m. on Monday, local police said.
Cops haven’t released the full text of the letters, but said the letter-writer threatened to kill any stray or feral cats he or she comes across in the neighborhood. Likewise, while police did say images of the letter-writer were captured on doorbell cameras, they’re holding the identifying details close to the vest right now, which they may do for any number of reasons.
One of the homeowner who received the letter said he fears his two missing cats are now dead. Another neighbor said the letters follow similar threats by a woman wearing a red jacket, who told some people in the neighborhood to keep their cats inside or else.
“The lady, she was walking up and down the streets going door to door telling everybody that they better watch out for our cats because they were going to start being euthanized,” the neighbor told WKSN, the local NBC affiliate.
Joplin police are offering $2,500 to anyone with information that leads to the arrest of the letter-writer.
Pain In The Bud 
Good morning everyone there’s some crazy lunatics out there trying to cut the population of stray cats out there not by getting him a home but by killing them beware your cats make sure they don’t get out like I had my cat indoors I would never let my baby outside we have to get information on who it is and get them locked up
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What is wrong with that person? Her hatred of cats is so strong she harasses cat owners and threatens their pets. Hopefully the police will find this woman before she harms more animals.
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Outdoor cats, whether stray, feral, or someone’s pet that is allowed to roam, slaughter multitudes of innocent wildlife in the US alone every year. As much is 4 billion birds and 23 billion other animals every single year just in the US. And there have been 33 bird species and about 70 mammalian and reptile species that have gone extinct due to cats. Who speaks or advocates for them? Do not these animals have a right to life? Why is it wrong for people to protect the lives of innocent native wildlife but yet the common cat possesses the right to kill at will with absolute impunity and without any interference whatsoever? Do any of you people care about these animals, or do you only care about cats? And in most cases the common cat doesn’t even kill for food. They kill just to amuse themselves.
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Matthew I urge you to actually read those studies. None of them actually measure feline predatory impact, they’re all either meta-analyses of old studies that have nothing to do with cats hunting, or they’re based on useless “data” like questionnaires asking owners to rate their cats’ hunting abilities on a 10-point scale.
Those studies are all conducted by a small group of birders and wildlife biologists, including one guy who advocates for the mass eradication of cats and a wildlife biologist who was convicted of poisoning stray cats. (She was caught on video poisoning their food supply.)
The studies they produce have no scientific value, they’re embarrassing and wouldn’t pass muster in even the most basic classes in the hard sciences.
Real science is investigative and follows the data. These cat studies, by contrast, are authored by people who already arrived at a conclusion unsupported by data and massaged the existing data to support their claims.
But don’t take my word for it. Read the studies. You’ll be shocked. And you can read the extensive criticism of those studies by actual scientists who are appalled by the methods of these nominal conservationists.
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