[My cats are indoor cats, BTW.]
Posted on 05/24/2009 2:34:10 PM PDT by JoeProBono
LODI, Calif. -- A community controversy is brewing in Lodi.
A neighbor posted a sign with the words, "Hit a cat, I'll hit your kid." Some neighbors said they are concerned their children's lives are being threatened.
"Basically what this is saying is: Hit a cat and I'll hit your kid," said Tina Teixeira.
Teixeira got a lot of attention after she put the sign up in front of her West Elm Street home in Lodi.
"You don't want me to hit your kid so don't hit mine. You hurt mine, that is just like if I went over and ran over your kid. Basically, that is what I was intending," said Teixeira.
Teixeira said she decided to take action after a driver ran over and killed her cat on the bike lane on Friday.
Some parents were outraged over her cardboard note.
"Basically she is threatening to hit people's kids," said concerned neighbor Joann Larsen.
"One parent said that I was psychotic," said Teixeira.
Teixeira said she wanted to shock drivers, not harm their kids.
Teixeira said she knows her sign would upset people but she put it up because she is tired of people driving 65 mph on a 35 mph zone.
She said she noticed some cars slowing down and reading her sign so she wrote a new sign.
"After burying the cat and calming down a little bit ... (I realized) that it was a little shock value. It got attention for people, so I thought that I would put it in more understanding terms," said Teixeira.
The revised sign reads: I watch for your kids, so please watch out for mine.
"That is the whole point here is to stop hurting animals," said Teixeira.
Teixeira said she isn't shy about yelling at drivers and even her neighbors. She said she even mentioned she spit on someone to protect her cats.
Only one neighbor wanted to talk about her sign on camera. Others said they wanted to avoid any problems.
"I do like that she changed it," Larsen said.
The animal lover said she can only hope she can keep her cats from losing another life.
Teixeira said some of her feral cats don't like to stay indoors.
She said she hopes her sign will get city leaders to install speed bumps in her neighborhood, which is right near a school.
Moderators, lets have a moratorium on these
‘jerk magnet’ threads. It is just like kicking a rotten piece of wood in a swamp, all these slimy ugly deformed creatures crawl out.
Whenever there is some post involving cruelty to animals, anyone expressing their love of animals or their desire to not see animals hurt, you have the same sad sick pathetic losers, who since they are unable to form or communicate a coherent thought about politics or current events, decide they will impress everyone with some callous moronic dead cat, dead dog story/joke.
They are so proud of shooting dead the pet of the elderly widow who lives next door. No matter that the elderly neighbor loved the cat or dog and it was one of the few things in life that gave them any joy or happiness. Never mind that in the remaining couple years of their life, they missed that pet every day and its death made those last few years sadder and more difficult for them. You had the legal right to kill their pet because it wandered 3 ft over your property line, so not only did you kill it, you were so proud of yourself you had to felt a need to brag about it to people on line.
Hooray, you wanted to impress us and you have unfortunately if were to tell you precisely what that impression is I would be kicked of FR for profanity.
What is apparent to normal people and too “deep” for you to understand is, that even if your cruelty towards animals could be understood because your dad was a wife beating drunk grade school dropout, the cruelty towards the humans who care for those animals can not be forgiven.
Lodi resident puts up sign to tell drivers to pay attention
After one of Tina Teixeira's cats was killed in the bike lane Friday morning, she had enough of cars speeding past her West Elm Street house near Mills Avenue.
[My cats are indoor cats, BTW.]
Very creative! Did you write that? LoL :-p
I could have went forever—without seeing that! LoL I love my cat.
I have an indoor cat. Folks around here do not like cats.
Yet another reminder about why INDOOR-ONLY kitties lead longer, safer, healthier lives.
Pennsylvania.
ANy cat owner who lets their cat run free is putting their cats’ life in jeopardy. From cars, from wild animals, from dogs, from parasites and a whole plethora of illnesses and bugs they can pick up from being out of the house.
I don’t like seeing a dead cat, but it is totally 100% the fault of the cats’ owner for letting it out. Most places have laws or ordinances that require dogs AND cats to be under the control of the owner at all times - that means on a leash, on a line in the yard, or with an invisible fence (for cats and dogs) or a fence for dogs. Cat owners always think they are exempt from having to control their animals because ‘they are not dogs’.
I wouldn’t say worse neighbor but I’d say bad neighbor. They don’t give two craps if their cats spend more time on your property, using your landscaping for hunting birds and small animals and ripping them apart on your lawn.
They believe the laws don’t apply to them. They are bad neighbors.
I certainly am not with the people that deliberately run down other peoples’ pets. That is sick and technically you probably could shoot at them to prevent a felony (if that is a felony where you are) of intentionally killing your animal/destroying property over $500.
However, anyone who lets their animals roam freely without any controls on them should not be surprised if something bad happens to them. It’s their fault. Not the one that actually drove onto the property to getthe dog, but if they are in the road and can roam wherever, that is not right and the owner is not being responsible for the welfare of their pet. Nobody will ever convince me that is responsible behavior.
If you cat people want your cats to be off a leash or a run line, you put in an invisible fence and get kitty used to wearing that collar. Cat will be able to roam on YOUR property only, it will be much safer but will not be constrained by a leash.
Your cat is not missing anything being indoors. It will probably be much safer and healthier indoors than being able to go outside.
Now THAT cat looks like a sweetheart. And has a good sense of humor. :)
You can add my sister to that list, but she outgrew it after paying for the repairs when she ran in the ditch. She wasn't hurt too bad, just shook her up.
Couldn't say about totals with any certainty, but I can vouch for two.
Woman swerved across the center line of a two laner to miss a deer, and went through the guard rail, and over the bank, to the tune of 100'. The crash threw both of her unrestrained kids out, then her minivan rolled over them, killing both at the scene. She spent several days in our ICU.
The good news was that the innocent driver coming around the blind curve towards her managed to both miss her & stay on the road, then call it in.
To be fair, hitting a deer isn’t exactly safe either. It’s sad if you hit a cat or a squirrel, but they don’t have an ugly tendency to come up over the hood with mass and sharp hooves to come through your windshield either.
I’d never intentionally hit any animal, but given the choice of a deer or a guardrail, the guardrail chewing up my passenger side might well be safer.
FIRST: Does anyone honestly think the cat was IN the bike lane when hit? I won’t go into specifics, but depending on what part of the car or whatever hit the cat he might’ve just ended up in the bike lane... (I don’t know do they have fences on bike lanes in her area or something? Do cats go to the corner and use crosswalks???
SECOND: Our previous cat, and our kitten whom we just had to put to sleep last month were both exclusively indoor cats.
However, the stray/half-feral cat that USED to be someone’s PET that they abandoned (according to neighbors), and was on his own declawed & neutered for at least 2 years in Northern WI (3/4 of both ears frozen off from the winters), still goes outside. He goes absolutely crazy if we DON’T let him out, and frankly I think it’d be cruel of us to keep him IN after at least 2 years of total freedom. However, we are also very aware that every time we let him out he may not come back (car, injury, fight, etc... etc...). He’s a tough guy, but he’s not invincible!
This woman IS crazy if she doesn’t realize that outdoor cats usually only have a life expectancy of 1-2 years (especially in a suburban area with 2-lane road with BIKE lanes). While I sympathize with her loss, she is crazy to put up that sign — while the revision is better, again, if she’s taking care of “feral” cats, then she should know that you can’t expect them to always come home — eventually they will either get hit by a car (like hers), or something else WILL happen to them...
As for those who now think I’m a “bad pet owner”, well, sometimes when dealing with strays or partially feral cats, it would make one a WORSE pet owner to make your house like a JAIL for them (and that’s what it would be, IMHO...).
What was her cat doing in the bike lane?
I do understand her anger, but she took it too far.
Yes, she did. Also, she should have blamed herself, her pet her responsibility. Plenty of other posts in this thread with more details about this concept.
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