this post was submitted on 14 May 2025

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submitted 22 hours ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 14 hours ago

Comic is more right than it lets on.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/ask-smithsonian-are-cats-domesticated-180955111/

There is little genetic difference between a tabby and a wild cat, so scientists think the house cat is only domestic when it wants to be

Can humans make a similar claim?

[–] [email protected] 55 points 19 hours ago (1 children)

Original for more pixels

https://bonuscontext.com/comics/domestication/

[–] [email protected] 30 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

If I ever want to find a higher quality version of an image it would be fastest to post it here and wait for you lol

[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 hours ago

I mean, the website is already on the comic. It took longer for you to type your comment than it did for me to get the original image.

I'm not using any special tools or skills. Just basic reverse image search and keyword searches.

It's important for people to know how quick and easy it is, and that we shouldn't settle for low quality.

I also think that if Lemmy as a whole started improving its standards of quality, then it would help us stand out from the rest of the internet that just spreads stuff mindlessly.

[–] [email protected] 29 points 19 hours ago

There's a little role playing game called "Call of Cathulu" that explicitly uses this as a story device. The human ape god was killed in a giant cosmic war thousands of years ago. This allowed some cats to get the idea that if they applied subtle psychic pressure to us, we would create civilization that would result in a comfortable life for cats. Human civilization is literally a feline conspiracy.

[+] [email protected] -6 points 22 hours ago* (last edited 21 hours ago) (8 children)

Slave owners argued that their slaves received benefits, like a place to sleep and food. Such arguments are only convincing to those who benefit from exploiting the bodies of vulnerable individuals. These arguments exist not to convince others, but to alleviate moral conflict within the person giving the argument.

The truth is, neither slaves nor animals need an owner's help to live and thrive, all such can do is prevent their innate expressions and rob their autonomy. Virtually anyone here would sacrifice some food and sleep for the autonomy to choose their own mate, raise their own children, and choose the effect they have on the world.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 19 hours ago* (last edited 19 hours ago)

Whether or not domestication in the first place was ethical can be argued, but in my view somewhat irrelevant now - in the world we live in now there are millions of cats, dogs, and others who are in need of a home and adopting/rescuing is a morally good thing to do. I would even go further and say those of us with the means have a moral obligation to do so.

Posts like yours do absolutely nothing to help.

edit: and I also often wonder if accounts like yours are a psyop to make vegans and animal defenders look bad.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 20 hours ago

with many animals the only alternative is to kill them.

[–] [email protected] 26 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

If I just let my dog go out and be free and wild, he would be dead within a week. He's 12 lbs, doesn't know the difference between poison and food, and thinks he's bigger than most predators. There's no such thing as a Dachshund in the wild. We have been domesticated by dogs and cats just as much as we have domesticated them. Our whole cultural trajectory exists because of that. The story of humanity is the story of domestication. You're deluded.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 20 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago) (2 children)

Maybe not deluded but definitely taking a moral high ground so high you can see straight up their whole ass.

To be clear, not arguing for slavery. Just pointing out that comparing human bondage and enslavement to animal domestication, is incredibly demeaning and dehumanizing to those enslaved people’s.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 18 hours ago

I'd argue it can alternatively be viewed as humanizing the animals instead of dehumanizing slaves. There are people who feel a human life is not superior to animal's life. They see the suffering of domesticated animals (eg. cows, pigs) as a super cruel kind of slavery, without being less repulsed and shocked by human slavery.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 20 hours ago

Yes, absolutely agreed

[–] [email protected] 4 points 20 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago)

The argument I have seen is that other animals share some needs with humans, but not all. All animals don't have the same social behavior, and so they don't have the same social needs. We know that humans have a perception of reality different from any other animal, like projecting oneself far into the future etc. I think it's not far-fetch that all beings don't share the same physical, psychological, and social needs.

I'd like to emphasize that humans wouldn't have more needs than other animals, just different ones.

So the question is: if the animals' needs are met, could they be happier if we gave them opportunities that satisfy human needs? Or is that projecting a human perception onto another being that's just different?

But the same argument was probably made by white people towards slaves: "they don't have the same needs than us". We know that slaves did have the same needs. Maybe something similar could happen with our perception of animals' needs?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 21 hours ago

Is this relevant?

[–] [email protected] 39 points 21 hours ago (3 children)

My cat chose to move in with me after being feral. She still spends the day outdoors, comes home for dinner, couch sleeping and breakfast.

She is taken to the vet against her will for vaccinations etc, but that’s really the only loss of autonomy she has.

[–] [email protected] 20 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

Mine followed me inside one day and just said she lived here now. And then two months later I came home one morning and she leads me to under my bed and proceeds to have five kids and say ‘these are our problem now’

Feat. Mama and eldest child

[–] [email protected] 4 points 17 hours ago

She got a mini me 😻

[–] [email protected] 14 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

Cats are barely domesticated. What that essentially means is that cats, if placed in a wild colony, will thrive and blend right in. This is not true for other domesticated species. Research also indicates cats domesticated themselves more than people did. They found mice in grain silos and warm beds in peoples houses and fit right in without needing to adapt.

I don't think humans are robbing cats of their freedom and anyone asserting so really doesn't understand cats.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 18 hours ago (2 children)

Cats are plenty domesticated, same as pigs and farm ducks. The difference is that they are quicker to go ferral than dogs, cows, or horses. Cats do great around human civilization, towns, and cities, but once they don't have humans keeping away predators, they quickly struggle. In North America, cats are now a staple in the diet of coytoes in urban and rural areas. Humans not only protect cats directly and indirectly, but we attract swarms of their favorite prey species.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 17 hours ago

Cats have always been both predator and prey.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 17 hours ago* (last edited 1 hour ago) (1 children)

Cats ate not native to north america. They're descendants of African wild (and sometimes Eurasian wild) cats. Return them to wild habitats, not just feral colonies, and the feral cats fit right in. They are nearly indistinguishable from their wild counterparts and don't struggle any more or less than them. That's the difference between cats and other domesticated species. Domestication is a genetic change. But, if the genetic differences from their wild counterparts are so minimal, how domesticated are they really?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 13 hours ago (1 children)

Dogs are fully genetically compatible with wolves, but are clearly domesticated.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 4 hours ago* (last edited 4 hours ago)

I didnt say gnentically compatible. Domesticated cats are nearly genetically indistinguishable from African wild cats. Genetic studies are difficult because cat species are so similar. In fact, several cat species including the house cats have been argued by geneticists to actually be subspecies of the same species.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC5612713/

This is truly not the same for dogs or any other domesticated species... Except maybe the pidgeon. I could see a similar argument for some pidgeons. Not the tumblers.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 20 hours ago

And the fact that she comes back after the vet indicates that she’s willing to make that trade off.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

Dude my cat literally came into my house and wouldn’t leave. He just chose to be a pet… he is extremely scared of literally everything

[–] [email protected] 3 points 14 hours ago

We had a really sweet girl cat come around for a while, hated my tomcat, wouldn't have anything to do with the dogs (who love cats lol) she would just sneak in, eat, avoid all other animals and come sit in my lap for lovin's for about an hour and then off she'd go. Haven't seen her in a while tho :(

[–] [email protected] 4 points 21 hours ago* (last edited 13 hours ago)

He so to people who have e.g. the boxes outside for stray cats (with heat, protection from rain and eat/drink + their freedom) "That is slavery" You are so fucked up in the head

Instead of Cat Island he calls it Slave island

Btw with your critic.... Stop using ANYTHING modern... Stone age technology for you... anything else you would benefit from domenesticated animals