Dressing up Cats

The BBC Magazine has an article about dressing up pets.

In the US and UK the market for clothing for pets is growing. But is it a sensible bit of indulgence or an inappropriate fad, asks Helen Soteriou.

I’m not sure Ms Soteriou even needs to asks the question, frankly. It’s a fad –  apart from those occasions where there is a need for the animal to have protection from the cold. And that is a rarity that applies only to those breeds without sufficient fur to provide them with natural protection.

Indeed, we even eschew the collar that is popular with many animal keepers. We do so for a specific reason –  anyone who has had an arboreal animal strangle itself with one of these will understand. For identification, we use microchips. Otherwise, the animals come as nature made them –  well, apart from the snip, of course.

The idea of dressing a cat up as Red riding Hood is obscene and an insult to the animal. If you really love the animals, you love them as they are, as nature intended in all their furry glory. They don’t need clothing and anthropomorphizing is pretty gross.

The Longrider cats are not dressed up, nor do they wear wigs. They come as Tangaloor Firefoot intended them.