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Urination on the bed (or elsewhere) is an
attempt to scent mark territory in an attempt to
repel an intruder. By mixing its scent with the
owner's scent, the cat is saying "My clan own
this territory". When a child gets scratched
it is rarely an attack by the cat. Most often the
child (who is unable to read cat body language)
has made a "threatening" move (grabbing
fur, pulling tail) and the cat has responded to
the perceived threat. After one or two such
encounters the cat usually gives the child a wide
berth until the child learns to behave more
considerately.
The owner's reaction confuses the cat. The
child has molested it. The cat has swatted the
child. The child cries. The parent consoles the
child and chastises the cat. The child's behavior
is reinforced; the cat's behavior is punished. In
feline terms, the newcomer is ousting the cat from
its territory. The "defeated" cat may
remove itself from the situation; this is
interpreted as sulking or the result of
jealousy.
Some parents are so over-protective that a
curious cat which sniffs a baby is interpreted as
a jealous cat about to attack. With a little
consideration for feline behavior and emotions,
introductions can be managed carefully to avoid
these cat/human misunderstandings. Cats respond to
the situation according to their more limited
range of emotions; jealousy and vengefulness are
human, not feline, emotions.
So,
Do They Have feelings?
Cats and other animals have feelings. However
their feelings must be interpreted in the context
of their own physical needs and their own
environment. They have a more limited range of
feelings than humans and their reaction to
environmental stimuli is different to humans, but
they show many responses indicative of emotions.
Although I have used the term
"programmed", to reduce cats to little
more than pre-programmed machines with a finite
set of available reactions would be wrong.
Those who deny that cats, or other animals, are
entirely lacking in feelings do this to justify
their own treatment of animals rather than through
any true understanding of those animals. Rather
than attribute full human feelings to cats, it is
better to understand how cats perceive the world
and to adjust our behavior to accommodate their
physical and emotional needs as best we can.
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