Editor:
Just days short of National Feral Cat Day (Oct. 16), I spotted a dead feral cat on the roadside, likely hit by a car. It was quite saddening to know its life and death would not at all matter to general society.
About three years ago, it was reported that Surrey has approximately 36,000 feral and stray cats, so many of which are allowed to suffer severe malnourishment, debilitating injury and/or infection by callously neglectful municipal government as well as individual residents who choose to remain silent.
Progress might also be made by discontinuing allowing pet cats to roam freely outdoors and notably risk them becoming another predator’s meal or some sadistic person’s target for a torturous death.
When I made a monetary donation to the local trap/neuter/release (TNR) program, a lady volunteer left me a tearful voicemail expressing her appreciation, which to me suggested a scarcity of caring financial donors.
No wonder. Cat TNR programs are typically underfunded by governments and private donors, regardless of their documented success in reducing the needless great suffering by these beautiful, sentient animals.
I fear a possible presumption of feline disposability.
Could there be a subconscious human perception that the worth of such animal life (if not even human life in regularly war-torn or overpopulated famine-stricken global regions) is reflected by its overabundance and the protracted conditions under which it suffers?
Frank Sterle Jr., White Rock
