| Homeless stray cats, heartless Singaporeans | by enragedemilystrange for everyone |
I had a similar experience sometime ago. I, too, have witnessed kittens scrambling to the busy road. In the blink of an eye all that was left was a bloody mess. Like Alan, I tried very hard to forget the unpleasant sight. Why do these little helpless furry animals have to be born to suffer such fates?
Life is hard as a cat in Singapore. That was what my foreign friend told me. I told him Singapore is a clean and green country, but I said it with a certain tinge of shame. I had wanted to tell him the truth : Our country is clean and green... and COLD HEARTED. Strays cats get "removed" every now and then whenever there are complaints against their existence. HDB residents are not allowed to own cats legally. Where should these feline be hiding, I wonder.
It was just yesterday that I witnessed a human mother and her daughter trying to move a litter of black kittens away from her void deck. I was in a vehicle with a friend, about to leave the carpark, when we overheard this mother telling her daughter, "These kittens are dirty! Do not touch!" She then packed them all in a box, and moved them to the next block closer to the road. When they walked back to the stairway, the daughter said to her mother, "Mommy, why do you have to move them over?" To that the mother replied, "Girl, black cats are dirty!" before throwing the wet tissues she had used to wipe her hands straight onto the ground. So much for teaching our younger generation how to be gracious Singaporeans. Is this what our children should learn? Is the lesson here to be selfish and heartless?
Is it difficult to spare some thought for the helpless creatures that share the same ground we stand on, and breathe the same air we do?
I practise TNR (Trap/Neuter/Return) regularly for my community cats, and I strongly believe that this is the ideal method for keeping our community cats population under control. TNR stabilizes the size of the population by eliminating new litters. They will in turn guard their territory, and thus prevent non-neutered cat from moving in.
I do have some suggestions to make us all better Singaporeans
• That HDB lift the ban of cats into HDB flats. If residents are not allowed to own cats legally, how can regulations like sterilization and microchipping be applied?
• That there be stricter law enforcements on animal abuses and abandonment of pets. Recently events have shown how lacking we are of a system to deter those bad examples of human beings who find pleasure in torturing others.
• To put in joint efforts in practising TNR.
