For your consideration–I’m trying to get rid of many things including games.

I can be contacted on Discord (if you have it, or if I’m willing to give it to you privately), here sporadically, or better chances via DM on twitter at the same handle I use here.

We need to embrace the fact that the tumblr userbase is aging. What’s everybody’s favorite kitchen appliance?

Everyone I have a very important message to announce to the world

Awoo

That's all. You can go about your business.

Hatesune Meanku

How the hell did the internet come to the conclusion that differing opinions on indoor vs outdoor cats is ANIMAL ABUSE

Because of science and statistics. Outdoor cats live shorter lives and die crueler deaths than indoor cats. That's not a matter of "differing opinion" it's a conclusion based on observable evidence. The "differing opinion" is based on arrogance and refusal to change behavior to improve your husbandry

It's hard for a lot of people to hear, because if you have had outside cats a lot of your life it's very heartbreaking to hear something that seems to say that you abused your animals, especially if you really loved them.

Also a lot of us as kids had outside cats and we didn't have any control over their living conditions, but it still creates much guilt.

That's not the point though. The point is that culture changes and we know more and have a better ability to do right by our creatures, and we can do Our Best now just as we did Our Best in the past.

Many people are not conscious of cats being non-native predators, don't think of them as invasive species because they were never told that. It's fine to not have known something.

It's also fine to not have known that cats can thrive indoors and they don't need to go outside unsupervised to be happy. There are very common myths about how cats can't be trained and how cats don't get enriched by interaction by their owners that dogs do.

With that said—it is a good idea to keep cats inside. I grew up with outdoor cats and had so many of them get gruesome injuries or diseases and die very young. There is the occasional lucky cat that makes it a long time, but most outside cats die well before their time. They get in fights with other cats, they get mauled by dogs, they get hit by cars, they get all sorts of worms and other parasites, and they get poisoned or shot by malicious people who don't want cats on their property. One of my childhood cats, I found under a bush with her guts ripped out. Things like that happen to the cats that "disappear."

These things can happen even to a smart cat. You can't be sure your neighborhood is safe. Your neighbor two doors down might get a Husky tomorrow that mauls cats. A drunk driver might tear through your otherwise quiet neighborhood.

Your cat doesn't have a cell phone that they can call 911 if something is trying to kill them. They can't yell "Help me!" if they are stranded somewhere with a broken back or some horrible injury.

A cat isn't thinking, "I'm confident that I can deal with all the dangers out here!" when it goes outside. Cats roam around because instinct makes them feel that it's a good idea to maintain a big perimeter of territory, not because they necessarily like doing it. They don't know what a disease is. They just catch a disease and they know that they hurt and feel awful, and sometimes they die.

For all these reasons I think the choice that makes sense is to keep your cats inside when you can't supervise them or keep them in an enclosed space. They're animals that don't know what we know, and we have the ability to keep them safe from lots of things. So I think we should.

and these wakeup calls come in waves. I never had outdoor cats, but my wakeup call was learning that declawing isn’t just a matter of ‘cutting the nail off,’ but amputating the entire fingertip. My late cat Oni went 15 years walking on the stubs of her toes because the gruesome realities of declawing weren’t common knowledge when I was a kid. Once we learned better, and committed to not declawing any of our other cats, this set her up to get bullied by younger cats who still had natural weapons she lacked. It’s a sucky situation. 

This is like that. We’re brushing the veneer of normalcy off of ignorant animal-keeping practices that have led to short, tragic lives. We’re presented with the opportunity to do better.

Yeah, most of the time I don't think people are maliciously ignorant and I think they care about their animals. I think there's a pressure to not have ever been ignorant about certain things, and it feels like if you're wrong about this thing you're just an awful person forever.

Y'all know how people say that "animal abusers" are unspeakably evil people that have something wrong with them. That's hard to reconcile with the fact that ~40 years ago, everyone you knew raised their animals a certain way, and you're pretty sure they weren't all evil people.

But sometimes you have to be like "I was doing my best then, and I will do my best now, and it's worthwhile that my best now is better than it was then."

People who try to educate others online about this, unfortunately, have had the same conversation 70 thousand times with strangers who often have no desire at all to learn. Which makes it hard to begin every conversation with the same amount of grace.

Also crucially important-

Your cat’s ability to go outside is not worth wrecking the ecosystem.

A lot of people think, and are SURE- their cats cant possibly be hunting animals or birds! But they are- because its what they’re built for. 

As humans, its our responsibility to be carers of the complex systems around us-Adding a predator/prey animal to a system that hasnt evolved with one will lead to needless death for local wildlife AND our cats. Its simply cruel to do such a thing. Even if you’re in the city- There’s still wildlife around and we need to do our part to try and keep the balance.

Add all this to the above- I had my wake up call when I realized coyotes were the reason all my cats died young- and its more crucial than ever that we keep our cats inside. You can take them on walks! Or in a fully fenced cat patio kind of area! It’s just not sensible to let them free roam when they’ll wantonly kill and be wantonly killed. 

As global warming’s effects start to show, ecosystems and animal/plant life will become more and more fragile. This is a definite way you can HELP- one more cat indoor is possibly hundreds of small animals saved. And we need to conserve every species we can, and try to maintain balance as long as possible.

hot girls have that one book they bought years ago and still haven’t read

Ladies, are we fatigued this evening? Are we tired

We sleepy sis

Exhausted even

Based on the notes on this post, the situation is worse than I thought

I hate being a customer I hate doing that to someone

strand of hair caught in hinge of glasses, 500 injured 300 dead

Something for Howan’s birthday.