I have commented at some length on this blog on the unloved nature of cats in Thailand [1] and on our rather inconclusive efforts to get rid of the stray cats on our property [2].  Today I add yet another chapter to the discussion of our feline population and its effects on the student body.  I also wish, later on, to draw some larger conclusions about this problem.

This afternoon, instead of reading a book (review forthcoming) that is both intriguing and deeply mistaken, or relaxing between classes after having given a pretty tough test in my first class today, I have been having to deal with a student who got bitten by one of our stray cats and asked to go to the clinic.  I am not the Duty Achan this week, but the other teacher did not wish to sign out anyone and so I did.  Then he needed to go to the hospital, because the local clinic, which is across the street from our school, recommended he go and get a rabies shot because he got sick after the bite (which cannot be pleasant; I have heard it involves a long needle being stuck four or five times in someone’s belly).  Of course, he doesn’t have any money (how these people have enough money for snacks but not enough for 46 baht to pay for a sung tow and a rabies shot is beyond me).  This required him signing a contract to pay me the change and the rest of the money as soon as possible.  It required phone calls and approval, and all of that was rather irritating.

Now, I strongly suspect that the student who got bitten, who is one of our third year students who has gotten in a fair amount of trouble for going off campus without permission as well as for having plates and silverware in his room, got bitten by the cat in question while feeding it.  I have never been bitten by the cats because they run away from me as soon as they see me glaring at them, much less walking towards them [3].  The whining Siamese cats of Legacy are certainly smart enough animals to know that some of the people here are not their friends.  But apparently they are not wise enough to avoid biting those people that foolishly persist in feeding these most unsanitary and non-cuddly animals.

Are there any larger connections that can be drawn here?  Some people engage in dubious charitable acts because of a misguided sense of sympathy.  That may certainly be the case here–our scavenger cats here at Legacy are almost as skinny as I am.  The cats here, in addition, must know that they are not wanted.  But at the same time it appears our students are not wise enough to understand why the cats are not wanted.  It is not as if any of us (myself included) are hostile in general to animals.  It is just that feral scavenger cats threaten diseases (including rabies, as one unfortunate and unwise student discovered), and so we would rather not have them around because they put us at risk.  I feel the same way about the scavenger cats squatting on property as I do about the #Occupy movement, for similar reasons.

The problem develops when those who are looked upon too tolerantly without having done anything to deserve good favor (for example, the stray cats don’t appear to be either cuddly and lovable or efficient mousers, either of which would be sufficient for me to think kindly of them and act kindly toward them) decide to bite the hand that feeds them.  When they start attacking the misguided people who give them a handout, then it becomes a more serious problem, because it suggests that mere laziness or ignorance, but actual malice, is present among that useless scavenger aspect of either the animal or human population.  And that is unacceptable.  I myself am a pretty fierce person as far as it goes, but I don’t fight until I am first attacked by others.  And then I fight to kill.

It does seem to be a rather common problem these days that people bite the hand that feeds them.  I’m not sure why this is the case.  What is the reason that people seem so indisposed to show respect and consideration for others?  There appears to be a larger problem afoot.  Generosity becomes entitlement, or is used tactically to try to humiliate and control others, and the resulting co-dependency becomes hostile and unpleasant.  We have to do a better job at preserving the honor of all, so that no one feels like a cornered and unlovable stray cat, and also that no one gets bitten by foolish acts of misguided generosity.  We may have much more need of generosity before too much longer.  We ought not to alienate those of a generous heart, as there are enough of us that are fairly pitiless to begin with.

[1] https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2011/05/11/we-are-siamese-if-you-dont-please/

[2] https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2011/10/03/white-lahu-cat-hunters/

[3] https://edgeinducedcohesion.wordpress.com/2011/10/31/the-cat-and-the-mouse/