Two winters ago I noticed a wild cat sleeping on my front porch door mat. I put out some food for him and so he started coming around regularly. After two months, he trusted me enough to let me briefly touch him. A short time after that, I saw him trudging through the snow in the front yard double-limping, with one back leg and one front leg injured. He'd been injured before but not on two legs, and I figured he couldn't fight off or escape from the coyotes with a double injury like that. So I captured him, took him to the vet, got him patched up, and kept him in my upstairs bathroom until he was healed. Then I let him go and he never left. He's become extremely loyal, following me around outside like a well trained dog might, except I never trained him at anything. He waits for my car to get home then runs out to greet me, genuinely glad I'm back.
Fast forward two years: He has the same dilemma your cat has. He lives in the house, sleeps on his own cat-chair in front of the wood stove, and has nice wide window sills for looking outside. He can also go outside whenever he wants, but if it is raining or snowing or bitter cold, he is perfectly content to merely look through a window rather than experience it directly. He went from a bad-ass Rambo cat, to a lazy house cat very quickly.
He's still free to go out and get wet and cold but he is also free to stay warm and dry too. I don't think he has lost freedom by choosing comfort -- he knows what living as a wild cat in the dead of winter is like and given the choice to be warm, he makes that comfy choice of his own free will.
Maybe the issue isn't that comfort requires slavery, maybe the frame should be on how available choices are manipulated. My cat is free to choose sleeping in the snow or sleeping by the fire, and makes the natural choice. For humans in Europe, there's no physical reason why comfort is unattainable, any barriers people face in this regard are political rather than real, and what surprises me is how many people go along with it. In this sense, lack of comfort is the enslaved position because subjecting oneself to that discomfort requires rejection of the physical treasures the world offers in favor of bone-chilling political propaganda. In my thinking, the fire is freedom and the ice is not.
What a wonderful story, thank you for sharing it! I may well keep it for future reference. A story with a moral, no less. Say hi to your cat from me!
Comfort/slavery is basically how the EU politicians framed it themselves -- it was cheap Russian gas that provided this comfort so now that we're proudly weaning ourselves off it, we'll need to compromise that comfort. There are currently also financial reasons why comfort is unattainable -- if your electricity bill takes up half of your monthly paycheck you're probably going to sacrifice comfort for financial survival. Since this is a result of bad politics, I agree the ultimate problem is political.
My cat is young and while he was born and spent the first four months of his life as an outdoor cat, when we got him, we put him in a flat. Now that he's free to roam again he can't get enough of it. Your cat knows very well what it's like to not just roam but live outside 24/7 and that's why he can appreciate comfort. My boy insisted on going out even when it was raining and snowing, even though he'd be back in a few minutes. He had to KNOW he can go out, I guess.
Two winters ago I noticed a wild cat sleeping on my front porch door mat. I put out some food for him and so he started coming around regularly. After two months, he trusted me enough to let me briefly touch him. A short time after that, I saw him trudging through the snow in the front yard double-limping, with one back leg and one front leg injured. He'd been injured before but not on two legs, and I figured he couldn't fight off or escape from the coyotes with a double injury like that. So I captured him, took him to the vet, got him patched up, and kept him in my upstairs bathroom until he was healed. Then I let him go and he never left. He's become extremely loyal, following me around outside like a well trained dog might, except I never trained him at anything. He waits for my car to get home then runs out to greet me, genuinely glad I'm back.
Fast forward two years: He has the same dilemma your cat has. He lives in the house, sleeps on his own cat-chair in front of the wood stove, and has nice wide window sills for looking outside. He can also go outside whenever he wants, but if it is raining or snowing or bitter cold, he is perfectly content to merely look through a window rather than experience it directly. He went from a bad-ass Rambo cat, to a lazy house cat very quickly.
He's still free to go out and get wet and cold but he is also free to stay warm and dry too. I don't think he has lost freedom by choosing comfort -- he knows what living as a wild cat in the dead of winter is like and given the choice to be warm, he makes that comfy choice of his own free will.
Maybe the issue isn't that comfort requires slavery, maybe the frame should be on how available choices are manipulated. My cat is free to choose sleeping in the snow or sleeping by the fire, and makes the natural choice. For humans in Europe, there's no physical reason why comfort is unattainable, any barriers people face in this regard are political rather than real, and what surprises me is how many people go along with it. In this sense, lack of comfort is the enslaved position because subjecting oneself to that discomfort requires rejection of the physical treasures the world offers in favor of bone-chilling political propaganda. In my thinking, the fire is freedom and the ice is not.
Also, you obviously have a high IQ cat.
What a wonderful story, thank you for sharing it! I may well keep it for future reference. A story with a moral, no less. Say hi to your cat from me!
Comfort/slavery is basically how the EU politicians framed it themselves -- it was cheap Russian gas that provided this comfort so now that we're proudly weaning ourselves off it, we'll need to compromise that comfort. There are currently also financial reasons why comfort is unattainable -- if your electricity bill takes up half of your monthly paycheck you're probably going to sacrifice comfort for financial survival. Since this is a result of bad politics, I agree the ultimate problem is political.
My cat is young and while he was born and spent the first four months of his life as an outdoor cat, when we got him, we put him in a flat. Now that he's free to roam again he can't get enough of it. Your cat knows very well what it's like to not just roam but live outside 24/7 and that's why he can appreciate comfort. My boy insisted on going out even when it was raining and snowing, even though he'd be back in a few minutes. He had to KNOW he can go out, I guess.
This cat knows where it's at: https://imgur.com/a/tnVTBdS
He sure does!