So is this a big loss for birds and small animals, or were the cats getting declawed not "outside cats" anyway?
New York state has banned cat declawing
41–49 of 49 posts
Re: New York state has banned cat declawing
#42I haven't formed an opinion on this yet. I love cats and my gut is sympathetic to anti-declawing viewpoints as I would never declaw a cat myself, but I'm seeing a lot of anti-declawing rhetoric here that makes very little sense if you look at it logically in contrast with neutering. If you're an opponent of declawing, are you also an opponent of neutering? If not, can you present an argument against declawing that is…
I’m curious, what arguments have you seen for declawing that are illogical compared to neutering?
In this thread:
> Declawing a cat is the equivalent to removing someone's fingers at the individual knuckle level.
Neutering is the equivalent to, well, neutering someone.
> I’d much rather an animal be humanely euthanized due to not being placed in a home than needlessly suffering from humans purposefully mutilating them for the rest of their lives.
> It sucks that we can’t find homes for every animal, but we don’t go purposefully placing animals in households that would abuse them just to avoid feeling bad about euthanasia. Declawing is abuse like any other.
Literally if you replace "declawing" with "neutering" once in this post, it's an argument that it would be better to euthanize than neuter.
Re: New York state has banned cat declawing
#43Earlier quoted context omitted.
Cats are legal to own. They get shelter, clean food and water including medical care. In fact people release cats into wild when they don't want to care for them leading to a lot of wildcats. While some places forbid cats going outside and encourage desexing, all this doesn't help the disadvantaged wildlife. Cats should be banned. Why not legalize ownership of domesticated native animals such as koalas for example? B…
It's so sad you're being downvoted because you're right. Cats are destroying many of the world's ecosystems and cats owners and stray feeders are to blame.
Do you want a plague? Because that's how you get a plague
Re: New York state has banned cat declawing
#44I know a lot of people that would not own a cat that isn't declawed. I wonder what the net outcome is on cats being euthanized, I'm sure this will increase that number.
I would be much happier knowing that these people not own any pets if they were unable to care for them in a humane way. Declawing a cat is the equivalent to removing someone's fingers at the individual knuckle level. It's impractical, cruel, and causes lasting physical problems for the cat.
> Declawing a cat is the equivalent to removing someone's fingers at the individual knuckle level.
Cats do not have opposable thumbs, but humans do. I would consider that a false equivalency.
Re: New York state has banned cat declawing
#45I haven't formed an opinion on this yet. I love cats and my gut is sympathetic to anti-declawing viewpoints as I would never declaw a cat myself, but I'm seeing a lot of anti-declawing rhetoric here that makes very little sense if you look at it logically in contrast with neutering. If you're an opponent of declawing, are you also an opponent of neutering? If not, can you present an argument against declawing that is…
Neutering is necessary mostly for societal benefit: It prevents stray cats (via catch and release) and/or runaways from creating more cats. Declawing is necessary mostly for personal benefit: You can't train your cat and therefore it must lose their claws. One is something that's useful for society as a whole, the other is useful because you are an asshole. That's mostly how I've seen the distinction. What kind of ar…
I guess the counterargument I've seen for this is that declawed cats are more likely to be adopted, and allowing declawing makes intact cats more likely to be adopted--both societal benefits. It seems like the fact that it also benefits an individual is sort of a distraction here.
Thanks for trying, but I think I'm still in the same place: I don't have a persuasive argument for or against declawing.
That said, my gut feeling is still against it, so I'm not going to exactly go lobby to bring back declawing. I wonder if that's basically why declawing is illegal in so many places--people following their instincts are against it, and nobody feels strongly enough for it to defend it.
In any case, I'm not bent that it's illegal now (I live in NY), just puzzled.
EDIT: Okay, I guess I have a question which would settle this for me: is adoption of cats actually a societal benefit as compared to having more strays? An Aoshima-style[1] island of cats doesn't seem like a dystopia to me, and it seems like stray cats are capable of caring for themselves without human intervention. There are probably some downsides (in NY state, ticks) but there are other solutions to those problems.
[1] https://www.theatlantic.com/photo/2015/03/a-visit-to-aoshima...
Re: New York state has banned cat declawing
#46Been illegal here in Queensland, Australia for quite some time now.
It is illegal in all of Australia, and also in: England Scotland Wales Italy Austria Switzerland Norway Sweden Ireland Denmark Finland Slovenia Brazil New Zealand Serbia Montenegro Macedonia Slovenia France Germany Bosnia Malta Netherlands Northern Ireland Portugal Belgium Israel According to this webpage: https://www.declawing.com/countries-that-outlaw-declawing
More generally, every EU country that subscribed the Convention of Strasbourg of 13/11/1987 and converted it in national Law.
[PDF]: https://rm.coe.int/168007a67d
Article 10 – Surgical operations
1 Surgical operations for the purpose of modifying the appearance of a pet animal or for other non-curative purposes shall be prohibited and, in particular:
a the docking of tails;
b the cropping of ears;
c devocalisation;
d declawing and defanging;
2 Exceptions to these prohibitions shall be permitted only:
a if a veterinarian considers non-curative procedures necessary either for veterinary medical reasons or for the benefit of any particular animal;
b to prevent reproduction.
Re: New York state has banned cat declawing
#47Earlier quoted context omitted.
I’m curious, what arguments have you seen for declawing that are illogical compared to neutering?
In this thread: > Declawing a cat is the equivalent to removing someone's fingers at the individual knuckle level. Neutering is the equivalent to, well, neutering someone. > I’d much rather an animal be humanely euthanized due to not being placed in a home than needlessly suffering from humans purposefully mutilating them for the rest of their lives. > It sucks that we can’t find homes for every animal, but we don’t…
To further underscore your argument:
The current viewpoint of most animal control organizations (with the notable exception of no-kill shelters) is that euthanization is one method to achieve population control, neutering would be another.
The human analog of that would be "genocide". But yet, we don't use the term "genocide" to describe controlling the populations of feral animals.
>Neutering is the equivalent to, well, neutering someone.
Compulsory sterilization [1] has been deemed another form of genocide.
Re: New York state has banned cat declawing
#48I thought part of the fun of having a cat is the claws. I really don't understand how people could mutilate their supposed loved ones like this, it's barbaric.