Give 'em nose jobs, I say!
That’ll show the little buggers what’s what!
Well smartass, how do YOU deal with animals or children behaving in inappropriate ways? Just let them “do their thing”? (great, you’re probably one of those parents that lets their “Precious, perfect darling” scream bloody murder for a toy for 45 mins in the middle of Walmart, so as not to bruise his “pwecious ego”).
I’m curious as to what your solution in this case would be. You seem to be willing to be combative, snotty and a jerk to anyone not believing exactly the way YOU do.
But I haven’t seen you either prove your wild consipiracy theories nor have I seen you offer any effective or feasible solution.
What the fuck? It wasn’t enought you scarred and mutilated your cat for life? Now you’re keeping her confined and isolated in the “cat room”? Judging by your warped and sociopathic sense of compassion the “cat room” is probably a small wooden box littered with rusty nails and human waste. NOTA BENE! If you can’t handle the responsibility of owning a cat and everything that comes with it, don’t get a cat, dumb ass!
CAT CLAWS FOR LIFE, FUCKERS!
I hope LV doesn’t mind this hijack too much.
I had heard that declawing is a divisive subject, but really hadn’t encountered the debate before this thread. So far, most of the anti-declawing people seem to be highly irrational and unable to back their statements up with calm reasoned facts. I’m going to give them the benefit of the doubt, and assume that they have posted their well-reasoned arguments in some thread I have yet to encounter.
Does anyone who has familiarity with the subject matter have a pointer or two to threads on the 'Dope where I can go and educate myself on both sides of the debate? I am not looking for single-sided web sites nor personal anecdotal evidence to be posted in this thread. I am looking for discussions on this, the Straight Dope Message Board, that discuss the issue.
Thanks for any pointers!
And now, back to the original discussion…
JOhn.
$20 bucks says this whooshes no less then 5 people.
And yes I was being redundant on purpose, thanks for asking. 
Gosh, I hope she reads this far down in the post. Just to let you know… I have known seven different cats (owned by close family) that have been declawed and it is the same thing every time. They come home, they are all pissy because they’ve just been to the vet, the lick at their paws (be careful about that one cat did it too much and reopened his stiches), they go and hide and act like they hate you. Come the next day or the next evening, they are back to their old self. The only side effects I have seen from a declawing is the cats occasionally get a small paw twitch where they pick up their paw while sitting and whip it back and forth for a second, and that my cat (who used to dash outside and climb trees) got a nasty suprise the first time he tried to tree a squirrel after he got declawed.
You cat will still love you and still be a good cat.
I am one of the evil ones who has declawed a cat.
In general, I don’t think declawing is particularly nice but sometimes is the only option as a last resort (and should be a LAST resort). Before I encountered this cat I was adamantly opposed to it. I was of the “my cat is more important than any furniture” mindset.
However, this particular cat destroyed everything: the sofa, the rugs, the curtains, my clothes, the WALLS (yes, she clawed up the dry wall)! I tried everything at the time. Nothing worked.
The cat was already about 13 when I got her and had been a stray for a while (she was obviously a housecat once because she’d been spayed, but at the time I found her she was living in the wilds of downtown Baltimore, skinny, bald in places, and very beat up). Either she was past training, or just darn determined to claw up everything. I tried for a year to solve the problem.
I could have lived with scratched up stuff–I couldn’t live in a house full of nothing but shreds! I finally had her declawed. I felt guilty. Terribly guilty. I got over it. So did the cat–she lived 8 more years with me and we had many happy, lovng moments together.
Sure, if I’d asked the cat and she could have answered, she probably would have wanted to keep her claws. She probably would have also wanted free choice tuna all day long if I’d asked her. But she didn’t make the rules.
I took her in, loved her like crazy, spent countless hours cuddling her and playing with her, gave her regular meals, nursed her through the illnesses she had when I found her, kept her vaccinated and healthy after that, bought her innumerable cat toys and climbing things, and I cried like a baby when she finally passed away. Overall, I’d say she got a good deal.
Eve’s posting of this twisted humor makes me wonder-What is the dividing line between flirting and stalking? Between flirting and begging?
Does it matter that I own a set of technoknight armor made from trash and am willing to sing Dulcinea below your appartment window?
Doc Cathode
Knight Of The Bizarre Gadgets
Lady Venom, you’re doing the right thing. I have four cats that are, for all intents and purposes, my children. All four of them are front declawed for different reasons.
The first was declawed because we would come home from work and literally find him stuck on the drapes almost all the way up to the ceiling. He couldn’t figure out how to get back down to save his life. He was declawed for his own safety.
The second cat is a sweet little girl that we got from our vet’s office (a cats-only practice.) She has a deformed, delicate wrist and was rescued from from an abandoned building, and as far as anyone knew, she never encountered carpeting. There was a fear amongst the vets and staff that she could get her claws caught, panic and yank her paw hard enough that her wrist would break. After much debate, I let her be front declawed before I brought her home.
The final two cats are brothers that I adopted at two months old from my vet’s office. They were feral and spent a lot of time outside climbing things. I was advised to have them front declawed, and I said that I didn’t want to rush to a decision on it. The climbing wasn’t so bad, but they both had this thing for jumping up on me, hooking on with one claw, then sliding down my body. After the first weekend, I was literally covered with bloody scratches. I couldn’t turn my back on them for two seconds, and I certainly wasn’t going to keep them constantly caged. Giving them up wasn’t an option either.
Did I feel guilty? Of course I did, each and every time. It’s only natural to feel this way. The thing is, sometimes we have to do things that we don’t want to because we have to.
All four of my cats came through fine. They were all up and back to normal within 36 hours of the surgery. They didn’t turn into “biters.” When they play-bite me, they are incredibly gentle. As a matter of fact, they bite way less than my late cat that had all of his claws. Most of the time, you don’t realize that they were ever declawed. Their activity is at the same level as any normal cat. Well, not quite normal. One of my two younger cats always manages to get on top of doors. So much for declawed cats not being able to get around.
Just a side note for people that are ready to scream about this - my cats never go outside unless a.) they’re on a harness and leash or b.) they’re in a carrier.
There appears to be quite a bit of flaming on each side of the issue, so don’t only blame the anti-declawers.
Poor LadyVenom - will you ever ask for support again? I hope so! Keep us updated on your furkid. I’m glad she’s doing well.
Say what? I don’t see any; I want some declawing flaming! Like… “Hey you! Declawing is for pushover fuckers, they still run around and bother you! I had to chop off Froo-froo’s legs. And then staple him to the wall so he’s out of the way. I made it the outside wall so he doesn’t shed on the carpet! I visit him every week, what’s your problem???”
Yeah. Like that. 
Don’t worry too much about this thread, Lady Venom. Just like such topics as gun control, the 2000 Election, and France, declawing “discussions” have a long history here and elsewhere on the net of turning out exactly this way. However, it seems that it’s only the declawing threads which generate the large number of angry new posters who violate Forum Rules, and sockpuppets.
FTR, I didn’t want to declaw my cats either, but nothing seemed to work with them. The Softpaws seemed to be a scam of Hubbardesque proportions, trimming had to be kept up religiously and resulted in much pain to self and kitty (along with some glorious infections for me), Tabasco on items was licked up greedily, and punishment ineffective. Aluminium foil, bubble wrap…nope. Finally, it had to be done.
Well, Lady Venom, it looks like there is only one thing to do. To make everyone happy, have your cat put down. That way, you don’t have to turn it back into the shelter, but you will satisfy all the people that are calling you evil for considering declawing. You didn’t declaw and the animal is no longer part of the over-population. Everybody happy now?
[/sarcasm]
Let’s see here:
Lady Venom has two conflicting desires: she wants to have a particular cat and she wants to have intact furniture. She can’t have both, so her options are: change the cat and keep the furniture, or change the furniture and keep the cat. She chooses to change the cat (by having its physiology surgically altered) and keep her furniture. All well and good.
She then comes onto the Straight Dope and posts in the Pit asking people to make her feel better by reassuring her that her priorities don’t mean she’s a bad person.
That was a mistake.
TVAA - she didn’t post in The Pit, it was moved here.
Oh. Where did she post again?
Hmm. This wouldn’t have been appropriate for any of the other forums, so arguably posting wherever this was originally posted was the second mistake.
Not expecting to be hammered in a thread about declawing was the third…
What was the fourth?
Hammered? The vast majority of people sided with her. She had a choice between taking the cat to shelter, where there’s a possibility of it not finding another home and being put to sleep or declawing. I’m certainly not “pro-declawing” but in this situation she made the right choice.
TVAA - it’s official.
You’re a moron. Please go directly to jail. Do not pass go. Do not collect $100.
Are you a moderator here?
It was perfectly appropriate for MPSIMS where it started out until morons started flaming her, which caused the thread to get moved to the Pit.
And please explain how returning the cat to the shelter with the explanation that it is shredding furniture all to hell and cannot be trained out the the behavior, which will in all probability result in the animal being euthanized, is a better option.