Spaying and Neutering Cats in Popular Culture
Examples and Subversions of Cats Fear Neutering
1) The Sylvester and Tweety Mysteries used this kind of joke in the episode "Fifty Karat Furball" when Tweety offers to help Sylvester get the I of Istanbul out of his stomach and tries to assure him by saying he'll be fixed in no time. Sylvester panics at the mention of "fixed," which causes Tweety to acknowledge that he used a very poor choice of words.
2) In a Treehouse of Horror episode of The Simpsons (that I mentioned before), when the cartoon tom, Scratchy falls in love with the “real” molly, Snowball II, Marge decides that Scratchy will have to be neutered, to which he reacts appropriately.
Scratchy: You're beautiful.
Marge: Aww, somebody's in love. That means you have to be neutered.
Scratchy: Noooooooooooo!!!
3) In the Abridged Series None Piece, Luffy mentions this about Django attempting to spay and neuter cats.
4) Partially subverted in Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal where Charles Darwin keeps telling a cat to "eat, f***, fight!" until he gets neutered and stops listening.
Darwin: "But... if you don't have me, you don't have a purpose in life... so..."
Fat, lazy Cat: "Sooooo haaaapppy."
5) In Faux Pas, Kira the cat ran off and lived at the zoo for a few weeks after she heard her owners talking about getting her fixed. But, she later confesses that she was spayed pre-adoption and just doesn't want her numerous "friends" to think she's too domesticated.
6) This was Garfield's initial reason for dreading the vet — his uncle Bernie went there once and came back as his aunt Bernice.
7) A Robot Chicken skit has Garfield on a parody of The Biggest Loser wanting to lose weight so he can lick his balls. When he does, he finds that Jon "Monday'ed" them.
8) In Sabrina the Teenage Witch, Salem (a human warlock turned talking cat) tells Sabrina that she shouldn't kiss the guy she likes because he'll turn into a frog. She responds with: "Fine. I won't kiss Harvey. But if you're lying, I promise that you will be neutered. Slowly."
9) Spayed and neutered cats in The Book of Night with Moon are treated essentially as they have no biological sex by other cats. Played with in that most cat wizards are altered. Rhiow, at least, considers this something of a blessing, as it means she's never been distracted by estrus.
10) In the first Warrior Cats novel when Rusty/Fireheart first meets the Clan cats they warn him to leave the "twolegs" (Warriors Cats term for humans) before they have him "cut." Later he meets one of his old friends who has become fat and lethargic and concludes that he had been cut. Also, male Clan cats are portrayed as normal, but male kittypets tend to be a lot goofier. The latter is probably because male kittypets are “not really male,” as discussed in the books.
11) The cats in Tailchaser's Song regard neutering as a demeaning violation humans visit upon cats for inexplicable reasons. One previously energetic and affectionate female becomes sluggish and aloof after having it done to her. According to the cats' legends, neutering can even make a tomcat all but indistinguishable from a female. Partially justified as even though castration won’t actually make a tomcat into a molly (just like the same procedure won’t make a man into a woman), neutering early does keep them from developing the bigger jowls and cheeks of a mature intact tom. Therefore, you have a cat equivalent of a castrato.
12) A crazy cat lady finds a genie in a bottle, and asks for wealth, fame, and to turn her cat into Prince Charming. The genie complies and disappears, but as she starts to flirt with the prince, he says "Bet you must really regret having me neutered now".
13) An old gag. Two men in a factory. A new apprentice asks "What's a ball race"? To which the old hand innocently replies: "A tom cat with twenty feet's start on the vet".
14) Maurice, the familiar of Thunder Dick from Slimy Underbelly, was neutered against his will at Dick's request. The cat is not happy about this, giving him even more reason to resent his master.
15) The titular cat in Simons Cat is positively mortified when the kitten tells him what has happened to him from visiting the vet in the cartoon, The Snip. The animator and author, Simon Tofield, has a pro-neutering position. Keep in mind that he is a British author and animator who holds this view and his series, Simon’s Cat, is a British work. The UK, although not as leery toward routine gonadectomies as other European countries are, is not as rabidly pro-desexing as the USA or Canada are.
Most examples of this trope treat the subject of neutering, the fact that no animal subjected to this procedure has consented to it, the breach of trust that this procedure creates, and that many animals, including cats, may fear it being done on them as just a joke when this procedure should be taken more seriously.
No wonder the Evil Eunuch trope exists. Because desexing/eunuching is the ultimate endocrine disruptor and can make the affected (read: mutilated) individuals less confident and more aggressive (This may make male cattle less aggressive, but they are an exception to the rule.), more fearful, and more on edge (This sometimes gets to the extent that desexed dogs can be deemed “unadoptable” by the shelters.), this trope makes a very good Freudian Excuse for the eunuchs in question.
Note that while the dog examples in fiction tend to get played for humor, the cat examples in fiction tend to get played for played for drama or more seriously.
1) The Sylvester and Tweety Mysteries used this kind of joke in the episode "Fifty Karat Furball" when Tweety offers to help Sylvester get the I of Istanbul out of his stomach and tries to assure him by saying he'll be fixed in no time. Sylvester panics at the mention of "fixed," which causes Tweety to acknowledge that he used a very poor choice of words.
2) In a Treehouse of Horror episode of The Simpsons (that I mentioned before), when the cartoon tom, Scratchy falls in love with the “real” molly, Snowball II, Marge decides that Scratchy will have to be neutered, to which he reacts appropriately.
Scratchy: You're beautiful.
Marge: Aww, somebody's in love. That means you have to be neutered.
Scratchy: Noooooooooooo!!!
3) In the Abridged Series None Piece, Luffy mentions this about Django attempting to spay and neuter cats.
4) Partially subverted in Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal where Charles Darwin keeps telling a cat to "eat, f***, fight!" until he gets neutered and stops listening.
Darwin: "But... if you don't have me, you don't have a purpose in life... so..."
Fat, lazy Cat: "Sooooo haaaapppy."
5) In Faux Pas, Kira the cat ran off and lived at the zoo for a few weeks after she heard her owners talking about getting her fixed. But, she later confesses that she was spayed pre-adoption and just doesn't want her numerous "friends" to think she's too domesticated.
6) This was Garfield's initial reason for dreading the vet — his uncle Bernie went there once and came back as his aunt Bernice.
7) A Robot Chicken skit has Garfield on a parody of The Biggest Loser wanting to lose weight so he can lick his balls. When he does, he finds that Jon "Monday'ed" them.
8) In Sabrina the Teenage Witch, Salem (a human warlock turned talking cat) tells Sabrina that she shouldn't kiss the guy she likes because he'll turn into a frog. She responds with: "Fine. I won't kiss Harvey. But if you're lying, I promise that you will be neutered. Slowly."
9) Spayed and neutered cats in The Book of Night with Moon are treated essentially as they have no biological sex by other cats. Played with in that most cat wizards are altered. Rhiow, at least, considers this something of a blessing, as it means she's never been distracted by estrus.
10) In the first Warrior Cats novel when Rusty/Fireheart first meets the Clan cats they warn him to leave the "twolegs" (Warriors Cats term for humans) before they have him "cut." Later he meets one of his old friends who has become fat and lethargic and concludes that he had been cut. Also, male Clan cats are portrayed as normal, but male kittypets tend to be a lot goofier. The latter is probably because male kittypets are “not really male,” as discussed in the books.
11) The cats in Tailchaser's Song regard neutering as a demeaning violation humans visit upon cats for inexplicable reasons. One previously energetic and affectionate female becomes sluggish and aloof after having it done to her. According to the cats' legends, neutering can even make a tomcat all but indistinguishable from a female. Partially justified as even though castration won’t actually make a tomcat into a molly (just like the same procedure won’t make a man into a woman), neutering early does keep them from developing the bigger jowls and cheeks of a mature intact tom. Therefore, you have a cat equivalent of a castrato.
12) A crazy cat lady finds a genie in a bottle, and asks for wealth, fame, and to turn her cat into Prince Charming. The genie complies and disappears, but as she starts to flirt with the prince, he says "Bet you must really regret having me neutered now".
13) An old gag. Two men in a factory. A new apprentice asks "What's a ball race"? To which the old hand innocently replies: "A tom cat with twenty feet's start on the vet".
14) Maurice, the familiar of Thunder Dick from Slimy Underbelly, was neutered against his will at Dick's request. The cat is not happy about this, giving him even more reason to resent his master.
15) The titular cat in Simons Cat is positively mortified when the kitten tells him what has happened to him from visiting the vet in the cartoon, The Snip. The animator and author, Simon Tofield, has a pro-neutering position. Keep in mind that he is a British author and animator who holds this view and his series, Simon’s Cat, is a British work. The UK, although not as leery toward routine gonadectomies as other European countries are, is not as rabidly pro-desexing as the USA or Canada are.
Most examples of this trope treat the subject of neutering, the fact that no animal subjected to this procedure has consented to it, the breach of trust that this procedure creates, and that many animals, including cats, may fear it being done on them as just a joke when this procedure should be taken more seriously.
No wonder the Evil Eunuch trope exists. Because desexing/eunuching is the ultimate endocrine disruptor and can make the affected (read: mutilated) individuals less confident and more aggressive (This may make male cattle less aggressive, but they are an exception to the rule.), more fearful, and more on edge (This sometimes gets to the extent that desexed dogs can be deemed “unadoptable” by the shelters.), this trope makes a very good Freudian Excuse for the eunuchs in question.
Note that while the dog examples in fiction tend to get played for humor, the cat examples in fiction tend to get played for played for drama or more seriously.