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[Arachno-capitalist]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=528694&in_page_id=1811

Reason #193 I can't believe the world isn't more in arms about the olympics in China.

[wombat]

Here's where I really thought my head was going to explode:

The killing of the six stray cats at the kindergarten - where staff at a Beijing cigarette factory leave their children - is the most striking illustration of the city-wide fear of cats.

Right, we all know that cats are more dangerous than cigarettes.

I'd love to boycott these Olympics but since I never even watch the summer Olympics on TV, it's not much of a threat, you know?

[lprkn]

Let me preface this by saying: I love kitties. But there are really many many more important issues worth boycotting/protesting the Olympics for.

[wombat]

But there are really many many more important issues worth boycotting/protesting the Olympics for.

Well, yeah. They are doing tons of other fucked up things - the cats are only one symptom.

Also - don't gloss over the cats because it's something they're doing to animals. It's something they're doing to people, since a lot of them are people's cats.  And as such it seems like it's all of a piece with the rest of the things they're doing to control the population related to the event.

[Doc]

I think it reveals this odd fact about the way the Chinese government functions. Just like western governments say, pre-Nixon, they are convinced they can tell people what they want and they will be believed. Judging from this article for the majority of their own citizens this seems to be the case, but if they are actually trying to impress the rest of the world and they think we're just going to take everything at face value it just seems... weirdly naive.

[wombat]

I am not surprised that the Chinese are believing the claims that the cats are a health risk - it's not terribly hard to get allegedly more sophisticated Westerners to panic about, say, cell phones causing brain damage, in the absence of much evidence.  But the other part is kind of surprising - that they're doing all these things to 'clean up' so things will look good to the West without realizing how we're going to react to the way they're going about it. I mean, even if they don't agree with us about how a government ought to treat its citizens, you'd think they'd at least be more aware of our weird little dislikes of things like having pets taken away and left to rot till they die. Americans are just funny about that kind of stuff - doesn't everyone know that?

[Doc]

Yeah, that was more my point, not so much that their own citizens are going along with it but they are (theoretically) doing it to impress us and we are obviously just sitting here horrified.
Then again, history has shown that so long as the place looks nice the majority of people are just as likely to forget about this by the time the games roll around(if they are aware of it in the first place) so maybe they do know what they are doing after all.

[Golfhaus]

Didn't Hitler try this with the 1936 Games? We don't have Jesse Owens, but it looks like they won't have Yao Ming, either.

[littlefallsmets]

For some reason, y'all made me imagine a boxing match between Jesse Owens and Yao Ming and... Jesse Owens just beating the holy shit out of him despite being a foot and a half shorter and then, during the medal ceremony, they both pull out pistols and simultaneously assassinate Hitler and high-five.

Well, for Yao its a low five.

But still. There's a moment of living inside my imagination for you.

[Lister]

Yeah, but Yao would be on the second-place pedestal, so he'd already be even with Jesse for the high-fiving purposes.

[side_show]

I am a huge lover of cats and all things furry, but I know with 100% certainty that the only thing keeping the situation with disease ridden strays in my neighbourhood under controle are 1) the fridged, killing winters and 2) the yearly cull by the Humane Society.  I've seen too many puss oozings, animals with gross rotting eyes, mange-ridden patchy fur and rotting tails hanging half limp, too many random animals staggering into my back yard, yowling in agony, maybe crying out for help or looking for a place to die. This is not to say death by beatings and social hysteria aren't terrible things, but just that the really disgusting act happens long before the collection and culling when people let their animals reproduce irresponsibly.    Locally the street cats have a pretty good chance of dying horribly and painfully by starvation, freezing, injury, illness or abuse, or if they're lucky, a humane euthanasia or if they win the lottery adoption.  I hate these 100% preventable problems.

Anyway, my really dark joke related to human atrocities that I always use is that instead of reporting "innocent civilians from (insert country North Americans tend to have no psychological attachment to) killed/maimed/tortured" we should use "innocent, cuddly, wuddly, kittens and puppies" because everyone can remember the last time they pet a kitten or puppy, but a lot fewer and remember the last time they shook hands with someone from Kenya, Iraq, Darfur, etc.  When watching the news I sometimes even mutter "cuddly kittens" or "the cutest puppies ever!"

Really though, boycott the games in China, and come to Canada for the winter games in 2010 instead - the SO's sister will likely be compeating.  She's a downhill skier in pre-Olympic trials right now.  She is 100% awesome.  She is in grade 7.  Plus in Vancouver the worst that happens is a serial killer going unsuspected, killing 50 sex trade workers over a 20 year span.  Oops - I mean a serial killer going unsuspected, killing 50 of the cutest, nicest kittens you've ever seen over a 20 year span.

[Doc]

I mean a serial killer going unsuspected, killing 50 of the cutest, nicest kittens pussies you've ever seen over a 20 year span.

Too crude?

[side_show]

If we're making dead hooker jokes is there such a thing?

[Doc]

Touche

[wombat]

Smells is right about street cats, but can I just say again - the thing is China is that these are not all street cats. They're frightening people into dumping their pets.

And yes, there is something to think about in the fact that it's easier to get attention for strange cats than for strange people but again, this is something they're doing to people. Maybe I'm a fanatic, but I think being allowed to live with whatever species you want is part of basic human rights, is the thing. And making people so hysterical that they'll beat cats can't be good for the general level of humanity in your culture.