The new movie Cats & Dogs is out and again a Persian is featured as a lead in a cat movie. They’re often on magazine covers, and I think that Persians are now the most popular feline breed.
My question is, why?
I love cats and have two Bengals ($$). But quite frankly, I find Persians to be, well, hideous. Their flat, smushed face is so decidely un-catlike. I don’t even find it cute, but unnatural and deformed.
I’ve also read that only 50 years ago Persians had normal shaped faces. So they’ve been made (bred) this way on purpose. Why is this look popular? To me housecats look handsome for the same reasons that big cats do. Why has this odd, flattened, creepy, Jim Carrey/Grinch-like look become so appealing for cats?
I too love cats but don’t like the look of Persians. My cat is a long hair “mutt” but has the normal face. I understand that the breeding for a flat face often leads to breathing dificulties in these cats. Seems a bit cruel to me.
All I know is that an old friend of mine had two white long haired Persians named Montgomery and Beauergard that he continually threatened to make a pair of slippers out of.
I was a former cat lover until I had to cat sit a Persian. He was an awfull creature. Ugly, moody, non-greatfull, fur everywhere… Until then, I could never understand why some people hate cats. Now it’s dogs only for me.
I wish you could meet my Misty. GORGEOUS cat-a Turkish Angora, with her little pink nose and hazel eyes, she looks like a little white weasel, or a Furby.
She’s the most easy-going, happy-go-lucky, cheerful, friendly cat you’ll ever meet. She LIKES big groups of people-most cats hate it when you have tons of company over, but Misty is right there.
My other cats are sweeties too-I love them all equally, they’re just not as outgoing.
A friend’s mother bred Persians for some time and the “flat face” is something deliberately bred for. (For a summary of other breed characteristics: http://www.bluepersian.ndirect.co.uk/standard.html)
When we got our cat from her he was a pedigree, but as he had a comparatively normal cat face, she said she couldn’t breed from him. He was given as a pet on condition he was neutered, so the breeders seem to be actively breeding out the longer faces. Unfortunately the squashed face look causes eye and ear problems, as well as breathing problems.
I’m not sure why the squashed faces are popular. I always thought it looked as though the cat had run head-on into a wall.
Personality-wise, it seems that with cats the more overbred the breed the more likely the individual cat is to be detestable. Most cats are good company, amusing, admirable, delightful. The ones I’ve met that I haven’t liked have tended to be either Siamese or Persian.
Ahhh Bengals…when I marry my delightfully rich guy who adores my every thought, he’ll instinctivly know that I need a pair of Bengals for my birthday. (Or maybe a Bengal and a Russian Blue.)
And yes, Persians are funky. Don’t diss siamese though, half breeds, at the very least, are good people. (I have two half siamese guys now. Love them to death.)
Oh, HALF-purebreed cats tend to be WONDERFUL!! I had a long-haired black cat Smudge who clearly had many Persian ancestors in his family tree. I think the influx of some new chromosomes works wonders (they are healthier, too).
I would love a Siamese…they are so affectionate! My friend had one…the cat would just crawl into your lap and purr like a motor.
But I love my kitties.
Two tabbies-Buffy an orange tabby (only one out of every 400 orange tabbies are female-that’s how rare Buff is), Gypsy, who is a gray tabby with a white belly chin and paws, Noel-plain white one with different colored eyes, and Misty, my Angora.
My beloved Fluffy was a dark gray tabby with bright green eyes.
My favorite cats, next to my Bengal, have been Siamese. Major attitudes, very talkative, and very affectionate. I like all cats, love most cats, but I prefer ones that really interact with you. My Bengal is very affectionate and talkative, and is such a GUY that it’s hilarious. Now, if he’d only cooperate more when I have to give him pills…but he IS a cat, after all.
My pessimistic answer to why people breed Persians and other unpleasantly-deformed breeds is “because we can.” In the grocery store the other day I saw something called “UFO” peaches–runty little squashed things that looked kind of like donuts with a pit in the middle. Who wants a peach that looks like that? But somebody found a tree with a natural mutation that produced funny-shaped peaches, and they bred the bejeezus out of it, because of this weird impulse we have to mold and shape nature, exploiting any oddity, amplifying it, producing distorted parodies of nature. . .
Whoa, sorry. Kinda went off on a rant there. I have a gorgeous tuxedo mutt-cat of classical proportions (except a bit rolly, and with a pouchy I’ve-been-spayed belly); I love her to pieces, of course.
Persians would probably be the #1 breed only because (don’t take this as insultingly as it sounds) all cats look the same.
Some are long haired, some are short haired, but they all look “cat-like”. (Duh, you say, they’re CATS.) If you want a different looking cat (to impress your friends, or you just don’t like cat-looking cats) you can go with a cat-looking cat with no tail, a really big cat, or a smash-face.
Cats aren’t as maleable as dogs. You have a lot of latitude when you pick out a dog. With cats you get… well, a cat. They tend to be about the same size, about the same height, you have choice of coat length and color. And the number of toes (polydactyls- gotta love 'em).
Persians stand out in the cat world. They are different. And (very importantly) they are NOT “free to a good home”. Rarety and a high price tag, this is what makes for a good cat. (Yeah, right.)
-Rue.
I can tell you it depends on the cat. My girlfriend loves Persians and has a chinchilla persian, 2 regular persians, and a mix of Siamese/Persian. Hold on before you judge that last one.
We seem to have the most trouble with the regular Persians than anything. One is a total spaz who hides from everyone and only now has begun to like me after 4 years. The other was overbred and has eye discharge problems so there is little brown droplets all over the place.
The chinchilla is a real love and likes nothing more than climbing on my girlfriend’s rack and sleeping there (so do I)
But the ‘duchess’ of the house is Chanel, the Siamese/Persian. She has become my cat more or less as she likes to hang with me more than my girl. She is very loveable and is very jealous of my girlfriend (even though she has owned her for 10 years) to the point of biting her when I am kissing on her in bed. For a cat though, she is very regal and we have no problems with her even though she is bred with the ‘hated’ types of breeds.
In world view, Persians are generally thought of as a kind of cat who would think of everyone below them due to their lolling attitude and general look. So its appearance as supposed world conquerer is not unusual and both my girlfriend and I thought it was quite hilarious
Someone was looking at a cat and thought to themselves, lets smack it in the face with a shovel… PFWAAACK!!!
Ta Daaa! Persians came into the world.
When cats have physical problems due to overbreeding I think we have a problem. The same thing has happened with a number of other breeds of animals like Pekinese dogs.
It’s just wrong to be messing with nature like that.
I’ll take my half siamese cat or my Heinz 57 dogs thank you very much.
I don’t get Persians either - the aesthetics of the breed simply don’t appeal to me. Out of curiosity, does anybody here have a cite on how likely Persians are to develop flat-face-related diseases?
My kitten is a plain moggy, but she’s never had a problem in her life. My friends’ Siamese cats (who, I suspect were bought from a dodgy breeder) have been in and out of the vet with asthma/colds/sinus problems all their lives, despite expensive medication and the best care. My dream kitty is a Devon Rex - if I am not mistaken, it’s a relatively new breed, so hopefully won’t have been overbred like the Persian.
