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SMNTY Classics: Where did the crazy cat lady stereotype come from? · Stuff Mom Never Told You

• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Hey, Sammy and Samantha and all good stuff Never Told
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: You production by Heart Radio. So recently we did an
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: episode on cat Nights, which is an Irish legend about
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: witches and cats, and I really had a good time
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: researching it.
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: But the history of tropes and stereotypes around women and
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: cats is a long and powerful and lasting one, and
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: the crazy cat ladio stereotype is one of them. And
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: this stereotype is going strong. I was looking into it
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: when we were doing that episode on Cat Nights, and
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: there was recent discussion about how has this lasted this long?
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: Why does it have such a foothold, And there's a
• 1:06
  Speaker 2: lot of history and reasons why people think this is
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: so past hosts Kristen and Caroline did an episode on
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: the crazy cat ladies stereotype.
• 1:18
  Speaker 3: I think we should probably come back and do a
• 1:20
  Speaker 3: little many looking at more recent things, but in the meantime,
• 1:26
  Speaker 3: please enjoy this classic episode.
• 1:32
  Speaker 4: Welcome to Stuff Mom Never Told You from Houstuffworks dot Com.
• 1:41
  Speaker 4: Hello and welcome to the podcast.
• 1:43
  Speaker 5: I'm Kristin and I'm Caroline, And since.
• 1:46
  Speaker 6: We're talking about the crazy cat ladies stereotype, I have
• 1:52
  Speaker 6: a little story to share. I don't think that I've
• 1:54
  Speaker 6: shared on the podcast before. But Caroline, stop me if
• 1:58
  Speaker 6: this sounds familiar. Okay, I really hope I haven't shared
• 2:02
  Speaker 6: this before, because yeah, it's it's whole story about my
• 2:08
  Speaker 6: well meaning nephews who are.
• 2:14
  Speaker 4: Ten.
• 2:14
  Speaker 6: They're twins, twin boys, and it got back to me
• 2:20
  Speaker 6: that they were a little concerned about me because their
• 2:26
  Speaker 6: aunt Kristen is unmarried and I hadn't brought a fella
• 2:33
  Speaker 6: to any kind of holiday dinners or other family events
• 2:40
  Speaker 6: in a long time.
• 2:40
  Speaker 4: And they were talking to my.
• 2:43
  Speaker 6: Sister, their mom about it, and they, like out of
• 2:47
  Speaker 6: the blue, just came up to her. We're like, mom,
• 2:51
  Speaker 6: we're worried about aunt Kristen.
• 2:54
  Speaker 4: We understand that she lives with a cat, she is single.
• 2:59
  Speaker 5: Like they essential.
• 3:00
  Speaker 6: We told my sister they were worried I was going
• 3:01
  Speaker 6: to become a cat lady.
• 3:03
  Speaker 7: And where did they get this idea from.
• 3:05
  Speaker 5: I asked them about it. I confronted them.
• 3:08
  Speaker 6: I said, boys, I hear that you are worried about
• 3:11
  Speaker 6: my dating status.
• 3:11
  Speaker 5: First of all, thank you for your concern.
• 3:14
  Speaker 4: I appreciate it.
• 3:17
  Speaker 6: Secondly, why what gives you the impression that I'm gonna
• 3:21
  Speaker 6: become a crazy cat lady?
• 3:23
  Speaker 5: And die alone except with cats.
• 3:26
  Speaker 6: And they they said, well, duh TV, they gotten it
• 3:30
  Speaker 6: from TV. Yeah, I don't know, I don't know what.
• 3:34
  Speaker 7: What TV they were, Lady, they were watching that Sex
• 3:37
  Speaker 7: and the City episode where Miranda like flashes forward and
• 3:40
  Speaker 7: is worried, like sees herself dead on the kitchen floor
• 3:43
  Speaker 7: being eaten by her cat.
• 3:44
  Speaker 6: I hope that's not one of my ten year old
• 3:47
  Speaker 6: nephews were watching. But it was hilarious because they were
• 3:54
  Speaker 6: so young and yet already had grasped onto this stereotype.
• 4:00
  Speaker 7: Maybe they watch The Simpsons with the crazy cat Lady
• 4:04
  Speaker 7: cat's hanging off of her I mean, you don't seem
• 4:05
  Speaker 7: actually crazy, though, And I've never seen cats literally hanging
• 4:09
  Speaker 7: off of your bathrobe, so it's happened. I mean when
• 4:14
  Speaker 7: you walk through a patch of cats in the woods
• 4:16
  Speaker 7: and they just accidentally cling on to you like those brambles.
• 4:19
  Speaker 6: Yeah. Currently, I don't own any cats. I've owned cats
• 4:23
  Speaker 6: in the past. I love cats. I would say I'm
• 4:26
  Speaker 6: more of a cat person than a dog person. But
• 4:28
  Speaker 6: at times now living by myself and though cat free,
• 4:33
  Speaker 6: I still feel like a crazy catwoman sometimes because there's
• 4:36
  Speaker 6: a neighbor cat that comes over to that will visit
• 4:41
  Speaker 6: me when I'm sitting outside on my little terrace, and
• 4:45
  Speaker 6: I have a fake name for it that I think
• 4:47
  Speaker 6: its owner has probably heard.
• 4:50
  Speaker 5: And why should talking to my cat that way? Yeah, like,
• 4:54
  Speaker 5: my cat is not named sir Lancelot.
• 4:56
  Speaker 7: Sorry, it looks like a Lancelot.
• 4:59
  Speaker 6: And I to catch myself because I will greet this
• 5:04
  Speaker 6: fictionally named cat and and also introduced it to friends
• 5:08
  Speaker 6: as though it were my own.
• 5:10
  Speaker 7: Yeah, I thought it was yours. Yeah, well, well I
• 5:12
  Speaker 7: thought it was a stray cat, honestly, and that you
• 5:14
  Speaker 7: were just like calling it things and maybe you were
• 5:16
  Speaker 7: a little loopy. No, I guess it's better that it's
• 5:19
  Speaker 7: a neighbor's cat, not just astray that is your spirit
• 5:22
  Speaker 7: animal or something.
• 5:23
  Speaker 4: Yeah, Lampslot's a little scruppy.
• 5:24
  Speaker 5: But anyway, anyway, enough about me.
• 5:28
  Speaker 6: How about how about historically why this association with women
• 5:34
  Speaker 6: and cats even exists because it has been around for
• 5:38
  Speaker 6: so so long.
• 5:39
  Speaker 7: Yeah, I think it's it's it always has, like people
• 5:41
  Speaker 7: have always somehow associated women and cats, and going way
• 5:47
  Speaker 7: back to Egypt, let's let's take a trip down up
• 5:51
  Speaker 7: the Nile, down the Nile in the Nile. Okay, so
• 5:55
  Speaker 7: in Egypt, They had Isis, she was a cat goddess.
• 5:59
  Speaker 5: They also had a bastett or bastet.
• 6:03
  Speaker 7: Feline cat, got Us, who became a house cat and
• 6:06
  Speaker 7: protector of women, children and domestic cats. She was also
• 6:09
  Speaker 7: a goddess of family, fertility and birth. And she was
• 6:12
  Speaker 7: depicted by a cat head and a woman's body.
• 6:16
  Speaker 4: You know what I'm thinking though now too.
• 6:17
  Speaker 7: No cats in the Bible, and I remember other cats
• 6:20
  Speaker 7: in the Bible. I don't know, but early Christians weren't
• 6:23
  Speaker 7: a big fan.
• 6:24
  Speaker 4: No, not at all. No, I mean I'm surprised.
• 6:27
  Speaker 6: So maybe like there was a verse in Genesis, like
• 6:30
  Speaker 6: right after Eve was created.
• 6:32
  Speaker 5: Then cat memes, Yeah, then cat and then a loll cat.
• 6:36
  Speaker 5: I ken has cheeseburger Jesus. Yeah.
• 6:39
  Speaker 6: The historically cats were ratters or mouses inside the home,
• 6:43
  Speaker 6: and of course women traditionally were working inside of the home.
• 6:46
  Speaker 6: So there, you know, there's a connection with the domesticity
• 6:50
  Speaker 6: and the cats hanging around, whereas the dogs were given
• 6:55
  Speaker 6: tasks outside with the men, like doing the hunting or
• 6:59
  Speaker 6: guarding the home or the property.
• 7:02
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 7:02
  Speaker 7: And this line was drawn by animal expert Andrea Arden
• 7:05
  Speaker 7: and Forbes, and she also pointed out that look cats
• 7:09
  Speaker 7: know where the food is, and they hang out around
• 7:11
  Speaker 7: the women because those are the people who are traditionally
• 7:13
  Speaker 7: feeding and caring for everybody in the household.
• 7:16
  Speaker 6: But then things got so twisted so quickly, And yes,
• 7:19
  Speaker 6: a lot of it is related to Christianity. For instance,
• 7:24
  Speaker 6: Clia Simon, who was the author of the Feline Mystique.
• 7:28
  Speaker 4: How about that for a punny title.
• 7:30
  Speaker 7: I'll see what she did then, mm hmm.
• 7:32
  Speaker 6: She writes, there's a lot of linkage even in early
• 7:35
  Speaker 6: Christianity that women and cats were actually celebrated, But by
• 7:41
  Speaker 6: the sixth century, cats were seen as a manifestation of
• 7:44
  Speaker 6: women's sinful sexual lives, which is ironic because now crazy
• 7:49
  Speaker 6: cat ladies are the epitome of spinsterhood.
• 7:53
  Speaker 7: Right exactly. Well, back in twelve thirty three it was
• 7:57
  Speaker 7: a bad year for women and cats in general because
• 8:00
  Speaker 7: as Pope Gregory the Ninth called for the death of
• 8:03
  Speaker 7: all cats and their female owners in an attempt to
• 8:06
  Speaker 7: rid Christendom of witchcraft. So there's that first connection between
• 8:10
  Speaker 7: women and witches. But there had previously been this connection
• 8:14
  Speaker 7: that people drew between black cats and the devil, you know,
• 8:18
  Speaker 7: and black cats being witches familiars and spirit animals and
• 8:22
  Speaker 7: stuff like that. Donald Ingalls and his book Classical Cats,
• 8:27
  Speaker 7: The Rise and Fall of the Sacred Cat, said that
• 8:30
  Speaker 7: the Pope's Vox in Rama was the first official church
• 8:33
  Speaker 7: document that actually condemns the black cat as an incarnation
• 8:36
  Speaker 7: of Satan, and from here on out until about the
• 8:39
  Speaker 7: early nineteenth century, black cats were just killed. They were
• 8:43
  Speaker 7: just slaughtered.
• 8:44
  Speaker 4: I had a black cat growing up.
• 8:46
  Speaker 7: His name was Smudge. Are you sure it wasn't the ferret?
• 8:49
  Speaker 7: You sure it was a cat?
• 8:50
  Speaker 4: It was the.
• 8:51
  Speaker 6: Cat, and he was fantastic, And I used to after breakfast,
• 8:57
  Speaker 6: I would go out to see him and sometimes takes
• 8:59
  Speaker 6: him treats of pans cakes.
• 9:01
  Speaker 4: It's much loved pancakes. I can't eat anything.
• 9:04
  Speaker 6: Uh Anyway, Yeah, speaking of popes, popes popes hated cats.
• 9:09
  Speaker 7: Yeah, Catholics none too big a fan. Maybe maybe there was.
• 9:13
  Speaker 6: A cat allergy in Christendom that was causing all of
• 9:17
  Speaker 6: this ill will because Pope Innocent the eighth also officially
• 9:22
  Speaker 6: excommunicated all cats and decreed that any found in possession
• 9:26
  Speaker 6: of quote unquote witches should be.
• 9:29
  Speaker 4: Burned along with them.
• 9:30
  Speaker 7: So if you were a Catholic cat, you were just
• 9:32
  Speaker 7: out of luck. You could not go to communion. This
• 9:37
  Speaker 7: continues through the Middle Ages, when, like I said, black
• 9:39
  Speaker 7: cats were thought to be witches, familiars, or actually witches
• 9:42
  Speaker 7: in disguise. And what's interesting is around this time there
• 9:45
  Speaker 7: was this male demon correct me if I pronounced this wrong, Bapphamet. Bapphamet,
• 9:51
  Speaker 7: who encompasses actually many of Bastet's characteristics that Egyptian cat
• 9:55
  Speaker 7: goddess and was sometimes betrayed portrayed with female breasts. Rem
• 10:00
  Speaker 7: missn't of the Egyptian statuettes of Bastets. So this little
• 10:04
  Speaker 7: cultural thing, like you know, worms its way through all
• 10:08
  Speaker 7: the way up to the Middle Ages, and people are like, well,
• 10:11
  Speaker 7: you know, cats are just evil, particularly if they're black,
• 10:13
  Speaker 7: and let's just give them boobs and that makes them
• 10:15
  Speaker 7: more evil.
• 10:16
  Speaker 6: Yeah, and they're evil in their relationship specifically with women.
• 10:22
  Speaker 4: It's a strange. It's like there's a discomfort.
• 10:26
  Speaker 6: In a way with how close women and cats may
• 10:30
  Speaker 6: tend to get. And it's a question that we are
• 10:34
  Speaker 6: still asking today why women love cats so gosh darn much.
• 10:40
  Speaker 6: For instance, there was an article published in Forbes recently.
• 10:45
  Speaker 6: I was talking about how it's all about the cat's personality.
• 10:49
  Speaker 6: You know, cats can seem independent and aloof and getting
• 10:52
  Speaker 6: their approval is not so easy. So maybe for women,
• 10:56
  Speaker 6: we like cats so much because it's just like a guy,
• 10:59
  Speaker 6: you know, and a guy, well, he's so aloof and
• 11:02
  Speaker 6: playing hard to get.
• 11:03
  Speaker 7: Is my cat gonna call me later?
• 11:05
  Speaker 6: Though?
• 11:05
  Speaker 7: Can I text my cat?
• 11:06
  Speaker 6: Yeah?
• 11:07
  Speaker 4: So we like put out food, pet the cat.
• 11:11
  Speaker 5: I don't know what.
• 11:12
  Speaker 7: A lot of people draw lines between women being all
• 11:15
  Speaker 7: cold and aloof and playing hard to get and cats
• 11:18
  Speaker 7: being that way, whereas dogs are more like affable yay,
• 11:23
  Speaker 7: well anyway, so they're asking in the Forbes article, why
• 11:25
  Speaker 7: are women supposedly okay with less obvious displays of affection
• 11:29
  Speaker 7: from cats as opposed to dogs and p A Salt,
• 11:32
  Speaker 7: who's a psychologist and animal welfare advocate, said that it
• 11:36
  Speaker 7: may be that women are more intrinsically gratified by nurturing
• 11:39
  Speaker 7: others and therefore do not need an external reflection to
• 11:42
  Speaker 7: reinforce caretaking behavior. And my eyebrow is raised.
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: Ooo.
• 11:46
  Speaker 6: I mean I enjoyed Smudge so much, you know, because
• 11:50
  Speaker 6: he would thank me for the pancakes in the form of,
• 11:54
  Speaker 6: you know, you do little tricks.
• 11:55
  Speaker 4: You'd stand up on his hind legs I'm sharing too much. Really, I.
• 12:01
  Speaker 7: Have no cats. Well, I don't have any good cat stories. Really.
• 12:03
  Speaker 6: Well, this was going on during the homeschool years, so
• 12:08
  Speaker 6: maybe Pe sometimes was cat training time with Smudge. I
• 12:14
  Speaker 6: also find this correlation between supposedly like catlike behavior of aloofness,
• 12:20
  Speaker 6: and independent independence compared to how women supposedly are. And
• 12:27
  Speaker 6: I'm going to put out a wackadoo theory that all
• 12:32
  Speaker 6: of this concern over cats and women is really a
• 12:35
  Speaker 6: reflection of an internalized fear that women don't actually quote
• 12:40
  Speaker 6: unquote need men.
• 12:44
  Speaker 4: I can now probably write a book.
• 12:46
  Speaker 5: Tell me more?
• 12:47
  Speaker 7: Is there more? Tell me more?
• 12:49
  Speaker 6: Well, I will tell you what's going on in my
• 12:51
  Speaker 6: head right now, which is the dating advice book that
• 12:54
  Speaker 6: I'm about to write based on how women should just
• 12:56
  Speaker 6: act like cats to get men.
• 13:00
  Speaker 4: Yeah, okay, call me up. Book published. Do you have
• 13:03
  Speaker 4: to wear a tail?
• 13:05
  Speaker 6: No?
• 13:05
  Speaker 4: Please don't.
• 13:06
  Speaker 7: Okay. So it's beyond just the idea that cats are
• 13:10
  Speaker 7: aloof women play hard to get women? Are cats cats
• 13:13
  Speaker 7: or women? It's weird. There's also these feline images of
• 13:17
  Speaker 7: women in pop culture. And this is coming from a
• 13:19
  Speaker 7: San Francisco Gate article that talks about characters like catwomen
• 13:24
  Speaker 7: and Josie from Josie and the Pussycats who were sexy, kittenish,
• 13:28
  Speaker 7: wild and independent, and that author Clia Simon that we
• 13:33
  Speaker 7: Christin mentioned earlier said that that just rubs men the
• 13:36
  Speaker 7: wrong way. And she says, think of the negative words
• 13:38
  Speaker 7: that can be used for women, cattie or sex, kitten,
• 13:41
  Speaker 7: And when people describe cats negative traits, they call them aloof, demanding, promiscuous,
• 13:45
  Speaker 7: the same thing people find threatening about women exclamation point.
• 13:49
  Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean the fact that women of all phases
• 13:55
  Speaker 6: of their life can be described in cat terms and
• 13:58
  Speaker 6: are described in cats.
• 14:00
  Speaker 5: Yeah, that's so.
• 14:02
  Speaker 7: It's very odd, everything from kitten to cougar.
• 14:06
  Speaker 6: Now, there is some valid research to back this up,
• 14:09
  Speaker 6: not just my mindless ramblings about how someone could probably
• 14:13
  Speaker 6: make money drawing connections between cats and dating in the
• 14:18
  Speaker 6: human world. There was a study published in the journal
• 14:22
  Speaker 6: Behavioral Processes in twenty eleven that found that cats attached
• 14:27
  Speaker 6: to people, particularly.
• 14:29
  Speaker 4: Women, but not just for food.
• 14:32
  Speaker 6: They looked at observational interactions between cats and their human
• 14:40
  Speaker 6: owners and found that the dynamics and human cat relationships
• 14:44
  Speaker 6: are similar to those in human bonds.
• 14:48
  Speaker 7: Yeah, it's interesting. John Day, who's a co author of
• 14:51
  Speaker 7: that study, said that the way cats and humans interact
• 14:54
  Speaker 7: with each other when it comes to food is similar
• 14:56
  Speaker 7: to the interactions between caregivers and infants, and he says
• 14:59
  Speaker 7: that both ca and human infant are at least in
• 15:01
  Speaker 7: part in control of when and what they are fed,
• 15:05
  Speaker 7: because I've been around moody cats, you know, I've been
• 15:08
  Speaker 7: around moody baby, and they can let you know when
• 15:11
  Speaker 7: they are hungry. So, yeah, they chalk it up to
• 15:16
  Speaker 7: cats having a different type of relationship to people than
• 15:20
  Speaker 7: dogs do.
• 15:21
  Speaker 6: Yeah, and especially there is the gender difference, and this
• 15:25
  Speaker 6: has come up in multiple studies where there does seem
• 15:27
  Speaker 6: to be a stronger connection of sorts between cats and women.
• 15:33
  Speaker 6: Although I have met many cat guys, like guys who
• 15:38
  Speaker 6: love cats to a degree, I've never seen.
• 15:42
  Speaker 4: In a woman.
• 15:44
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 15:44
  Speaker 7: Well, my friend Claire, she and her husband adopted their
• 15:47
  Speaker 7: neighbor's cat, and for the longest time, the cat would
• 15:50
  Speaker 7: not go to her. For the first year that they
• 15:51
  Speaker 7: adopted it, it would avoid her like the plague and
• 15:54
  Speaker 7: only go to her husband and be all over her
• 15:56
  Speaker 7: husband and not have anything to do with her. And
• 15:58
  Speaker 7: she thinks eventually the cat, you know, the cat has
• 16:00
  Speaker 7: warmed up to her. She thinks that maybe the lady
• 16:03
  Speaker 7: who owned the cat before was mean to it, So
• 16:05
  Speaker 7: maybe cats just learn an aversion to Meani's whatever the gender.
• 16:10
  Speaker 6: And speaking of women, another finding from this behavioral process
• 16:13
  Speaker 6: of study was the extroverted women with young active cats
• 16:19
  Speaker 6: had the strongest relationship. Right.
• 16:22
  Speaker 7: All the cat had to do was like flick his
• 16:24
  Speaker 7: tail and be like I want attention, and the woman
• 16:26
  Speaker 7: would get it.
• 16:27
  Speaker 5: She'd be like, yeah, let's play a cat.
• 16:29
  Speaker 7: But there's that whole, that whole attention giving thing where
• 16:33
  Speaker 7: cats remember kindness and return the favors. This study says,
• 16:37
  Speaker 7: if owners comply with the cat's wishes to interact, the
• 16:39
  Speaker 7: cat will often comply with the owner's wishes at other times.
• 16:43
  Speaker 7: So your cat has an elephant's memory when it comes
• 16:45
  Speaker 7: to playing and being nice.
• 16:48
  Speaker 6: Mm hmm.
• 16:48
  Speaker 5: And maybe since the female owner's at least according to
• 16:52
  Speaker 5: these studies.
• 16:53
  Speaker 6: This is nothing against any guys who love cats out there.
• 16:57
  Speaker 4: I know you're out there. You care for cats better
• 16:59
  Speaker 4: than I do. I'm sure that cats will will approach.
• 17:04
  Speaker 6: The female owners more frequently, maybe because we are more
• 17:08
  Speaker 6: attuned to those.
• 17:09
  Speaker 5: Nurturing behaviors as I'm sure some.
• 17:14
  Speaker 6: Psychologists would would say, to which we would both probably
• 17:19
  Speaker 6: raise our eyebrows our.
• 17:20
  Speaker 7: Eyebrows the race.
• 17:22
  Speaker 6: But getting back to the crazy old cat lady stereotype,
• 17:25
  Speaker 6: because that suggestion that extroverted women with young, active cats
• 17:30
  Speaker 6: have the best relationships. That's still kind of going against
• 17:34
  Speaker 6: this idea that only cuckoo older females are.
• 17:41
  Speaker 4: Crazy for cats.
• 17:42
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 17:42
  Speaker 7: Well, Forbes talks about some kind of common sense stuff
• 17:46
  Speaker 7: if you think about it. They point out that women
• 17:49
  Speaker 7: live longer than men, so they are more elderly women
• 17:51
  Speaker 7: than elderly men. At a given time. These elderly women,
• 17:56
  Speaker 7: maybe they get lonely and they may take in hungry,
• 17:58
  Speaker 7: straight straight cats who might reap produced quickly. Then they
• 18:01
  Speaker 7: point out, hey, you know, cats are more self sufficient
• 18:03
  Speaker 7: than dogs, so they are easier for older women to
• 18:06
  Speaker 7: care for. So maybe this relationship develops. Like if a
• 18:10
  Speaker 7: woman loses her husband and she's alone and you know,
• 18:13
  Speaker 7: maybe she doesn't have the best mobility. Yeah, the cats
• 18:16
  Speaker 7: are more independent. You know, you can just leave food
• 18:18
  Speaker 7: out or whatever, and that you don't have to walk them. Typically.
• 18:21
  Speaker 6: Typically, and on a very downer note, some suggest that
• 18:26
  Speaker 6: this kind of elder cat behavior could be a sign
• 18:30
  Speaker 6: of dementia. You know, the women are older, women are
• 18:34
  Speaker 6: by themselves by this point, and they're just caring for
• 18:37
  Speaker 6: more and more cats, and they don't know that they
• 18:41
  Speaker 6: have too many cats on their hands. And this also
• 18:44
  Speaker 6: gets us into pet hoarding, and animal hoarding is statistically
• 18:50
  Speaker 6: more frequent and older, isolated, socioeconomically disadvantaged women.
• 18:56
  Speaker 7: Right, And they point out that, like we said, women
• 18:58
  Speaker 7: might be drawn to stray cats because they're smaller and
• 19:00
  Speaker 7: easier to round up. There there was a an article,
• 19:04
  Speaker 7: I guess it was on the Today Show website about
• 19:07
  Speaker 7: some women who it kind of ranged everywhere from just
• 19:10
  Speaker 7: a young woman who had a cat and she got
• 19:12
  Speaker 7: teased for being a cat lady by our friends and family,
• 19:15
  Speaker 7: all the way up to a woman who had started
• 19:17
  Speaker 7: out as a cat rescuer, like, let me help these
• 19:19
  Speaker 7: stray cats and it turned into a really bad, unhealthy
• 19:24
  Speaker 7: situation in her house.
• 19:26
  Speaker 6: Yeah, there's a whole documentary made in two thousand and
• 19:28
  Speaker 6: nine called Cat Ladies that follows a range of women
• 19:32
  Speaker 6: who have lots of cats. And we did an episode
• 19:37
  Speaker 6: on hoarders and hoarding behavior way back when, and I
• 19:42
  Speaker 6: saw since then, I've seen an episode of Hoarders that
• 19:46
  Speaker 6: was dealing with a cat hoarder, and it was it
• 19:51
  Speaker 6: was I could you could almost smell the ammonia, you know,
• 19:53
  Speaker 6: from the from the excessive litter boxes.
• 19:57
  Speaker 7: Yeah, well, screen, So we've got this idea of cat
• 20:00
  Speaker 7: ladies regardless of age. And when you talk about hoarders,
• 20:03
  Speaker 7: these people often have major dysfunction in work, social and
• 20:06
  Speaker 7: daily activities. So maybe these people do just seem unstable.
• 20:12
  Speaker 7: But the thing that they're hoarding instead of I don't
• 20:15
  Speaker 7: know what you hoard, but instead of whatever it is,
• 20:17
  Speaker 7: it's the animals.
• 20:18
  Speaker 5: Yeah.
• 20:19
  Speaker 6: Yeah, but also but still that doesn't that doesn't answer
• 20:22
  Speaker 6: our question about like why the stereotype of crazy cat
• 20:25
  Speaker 6: lady is so pervasive because cat hoarders are a small population.
• 20:32
  Speaker 7: I really think it ties into witches, all the witchcrafts, yeah,
• 20:35
  Speaker 7: the early Christianity, Like you're a witch, you have a familiar,
• 20:39
  Speaker 7: you know, you have this animal that's black and evil
• 20:42
  Speaker 7: and associated with the devil. So yeah, I think it
• 20:44
  Speaker 7: goes back to the idea of witches.
• 20:45
  Speaker 6: And all the felineaphobic made that word up, felina phobic popes. Yeah,
• 20:51
  Speaker 6: nothing against Catholic listeners out there, but really popes got
• 20:54
  Speaker 6: a cat a break, but there has been some our
• 21:00
  Speaker 6: scientific research possibly suggesting that there could be a parasitic
• 21:06
  Speaker 6: link going on between cat craziness behavior male or female.
• 21:12
  Speaker 4: Really and this parasite.
• 21:17
  Speaker 7: Yeah, not to alarm you, but cats are taking over
• 21:20
  Speaker 7: the world very slowly. So evolutionary biologist, oh gosh, jerislev Flegger,
• 21:27
  Speaker 7: We're gonna go y Roslev Flegger. So this biologist has
• 21:33
  Speaker 7: been pursuing the connection between a parasite called Toxoplasma Gandhi
• 21:37
  Speaker 7: or Tea Gandhi in mood and personality changes in people.
• 21:40
  Speaker 7: And he had done all this research and reading and
• 21:42
  Speaker 7: he was like, you know what, it's kind of strange
• 21:45
  Speaker 7: that I will just willingly cross the street and situations
• 21:48
  Speaker 7: that scare and stress out other people don't seem to
• 21:50
  Speaker 7: bother me, and you know what, I dress kind of sloppy.
• 21:54
  Speaker 7: He actually tested positive for Tea Gandhi And okay, so
• 21:59
  Speaker 7: we'll explain that. We'll explain in a minute. But this
• 22:01
  Speaker 7: is a parasite that is excreted by cats in their
• 22:04
  Speaker 7: feces and it causes toxoplasmosis, which is the reason that
• 22:07
  Speaker 7: pregnant women are told to avoid cats litter boxes because
• 22:11
  Speaker 7: if they're infected, it can result in severe brain damage
• 22:13
  Speaker 7: or death for the child. So anyway back to this biologist,
• 22:18
  Speaker 7: he did years and years of studies, which kind of
• 22:21
  Speaker 7: sounds like crazy town, but he's gotten a lot of
• 22:24
  Speaker 7: support from other biologists.
• 22:26
  Speaker 6: Well, yeah, and we should explain what the life cycle
• 22:29
  Speaker 6: of this parasite because the cats will and it's kind
• 22:34
  Speaker 6: of a gross.
• 22:36
  Speaker 5: Life cycle, but let us go for it.
• 22:38
  Speaker 6: And if you're eating a sandwich right now, just put
• 22:41
  Speaker 6: it down for a minute because we're about to talk
• 22:43
  Speaker 6: about poop. Because first off, the parasite gets pooped out
• 22:48
  Speaker 6: of the cat. Now the parasite wants to find another
• 22:52
  Speaker 6: host so that it can get back into the cat, right.
• 22:57
  Speaker 7: Yeah, so it can so can hear its whole little
• 22:59
  Speaker 7: life cycle in the cat stomach?
• 23:00
  Speaker 4: Yeah, and it and it can reproduce.
• 23:03
  Speaker 6: So this theory is that the cats poop out this parasite.
• 23:07
  Speaker 6: Humans get in contact with the poop, get the parasite,
• 23:11
  Speaker 6: and then engage because of the parasite wreaking havoc in
• 23:16
  Speaker 6: our brains, engage in reckless behavior such as crossing the
• 23:21
  Speaker 6: street willy nilly without looking to see if cars are coming,
• 23:24
  Speaker 6: so that we will then die and the parasite can
• 23:29
  Speaker 6: get back into the cat, which will come up, you know,
• 23:31
  Speaker 6: a straight cat.
• 23:32
  Speaker 4: We'll wander up and start licking.
• 23:34
  Speaker 7: Our just like in Batman when what's her name falls
• 23:37
  Speaker 7: out of the window, Selena and all those cats crawl over. Yeah,
• 23:40
  Speaker 7: and she's probably infected because she had so many cats.
• 23:42
  Speaker 6: She probably handled the cat litter box, got the parasite,
• 23:45
  Speaker 6: probably got tea gandhi. And then those cats come back
• 23:48
  Speaker 6: start eating your spilled guts, only to get the parasite
• 23:53
  Speaker 6: poop it out again in the circle of life continues.
• 23:56
  Speaker 7: Yeah, take that, Elton John. So he found that study subjects,
• 24:00
  Speaker 7: He did a ton of studies just across the board,
• 24:03
  Speaker 7: all different types of people, and he found that study
• 24:05
  Speaker 7: subjects had significantly delayed reaction times. Those who tested positive
• 24:09
  Speaker 7: for the parasite were about two and a half times
• 24:12
  Speaker 7: more likely to get into a car accident.
• 24:15
  Speaker 6: This reminds me of when we were doing the podcast
• 24:19
  Speaker 6: on Luck we talked about that one study finding that
• 24:25
  Speaker 6: traffic accidents go up on Friday the thirteenth. So listen,
• 24:28
  Speaker 6: if it's Friday the thirteenth, and you might have this parasite, stay.
• 24:33
  Speaker 7: Hold take the bus.
• 24:34
  Speaker 4: Well.
• 24:35
  Speaker 7: So he found that and this. You know, Kristen made
• 24:38
  Speaker 7: the comment earlier about extroverted young women and having young
• 24:41
  Speaker 7: active cats that goes against the typical stereotype of a
• 24:45
  Speaker 7: shut in spinster cat lady. Well, this also does because
• 24:49
  Speaker 7: infected women tend to be more outgoing, trusting, image conscious,
• 24:53
  Speaker 7: and rule abiding, whereas infected men are the opposite. They
• 24:56
  Speaker 7: become more introverted, suspicious, oblivious to others opinions of them,
• 25:00
  Speaker 7: and inclined to disregard roles. And so you're thinking, well,
• 25:03
  Speaker 7: if they have the parasite, if a man and a
• 25:04
  Speaker 7: woman have a parasite that's the same, why are they
• 25:07
  Speaker 7: acting differently? And he brings up his anxiety theory, which
• 25:11
  Speaker 7: we Chris and I have talked about stress and anxiety
• 25:13
  Speaker 7: responses in men and women, and how women want to
• 25:16
  Speaker 7: go forth and be around people when they are stressed
• 25:19
  Speaker 7: and nurture, whereas men withdraw. And so he thinks that
• 25:22
  Speaker 7: this parasite is like bringing out some of our anxiety responses.
• 25:26
  Speaker 5: Huh yeah.
• 25:27
  Speaker 6: And not only that, infected men have elevated testosterone, which
• 25:32
  Speaker 6: would make sense for increased risk taking behavior, and women
• 25:36
  Speaker 6: shown photos of these men rated them as more masculine
• 25:39
  Speaker 6: than pictures of uninfected men. Whoh, this parasite is quite powerful,
• 25:45
  Speaker 6: I know.
• 25:46
  Speaker 7: And it's funny because so there is a New York
• 25:48
  Speaker 7: Times article about it and the author was, you know,
• 25:51
  Speaker 7: she had flown to Prog to have interviews with this
• 25:54
  Speaker 7: guy and all throughout this because you hear these things
• 25:57
  Speaker 7: and you're like, oh, I'm feeling out going in image
• 26:00
  Speaker 7: conscious today. I hope I'm not infected. Well, she she
• 26:04
  Speaker 7: got tested and of course it turned out negative, right,
• 26:07
  Speaker 7: So I mean, you can't blame a parasite for everything,
• 26:09
  Speaker 7: or can you?
• 26:10
  Speaker 4: Or can you?
• 26:11
  Speaker 7: They also tie it to schizophrenia, which is interesting. They
• 26:15
  Speaker 7: say that it could very well trigger schizophrenia in genetically
• 26:20
  Speaker 7: susceptible people because in schizophrenia, dopamine production is ramped up
• 26:24
  Speaker 7: in your brain, and the parasite actually, coincidentally or not,
• 26:29
  Speaker 7: has two genes that allow it to boost dopamine production
• 26:33
  Speaker 7: in the host brain. So these antipsychotics that schizophrenics take
• 26:37
  Speaker 7: that are designed to quell delusions because of their disease
• 26:41
  Speaker 7: blocks the action of dopamine. But the scientist Flegger thinks
• 26:45
  Speaker 7: that it could actually be blocking the parasite.
• 26:50
  Speaker 6: Now listen to this when it comes to schizophrenia, okay, And.
• 26:55
  Speaker 5: I feel like this is this is when we should.
• 26:57
  Speaker 6: Be pulling in Matt and been from stuff they don't
• 27:01
  Speaker 6: want you to know, because I feel like I'm getting
• 27:03
  Speaker 6: very conspiracy theory esque, because brace yourself.
• 27:09
  Speaker 4: Psychologist E.
• 27:10
  Speaker 6: Fuller Tory, when talking about the possible connection between schizophrenia
• 27:16
  Speaker 6: and TI Gandhi, points out that schizophrenia didn't rise in
• 27:20
  Speaker 6: prevalence until the latter half of the eighteenth century, when
• 27:24
  Speaker 6: people in Paris and London started keeping cats as pets.
• 27:29
  Speaker 7: Dun dun, dum.
• 27:34
  Speaker 4: What is much done to me?
• 27:35
  Speaker 6: Now?
• 27:36
  Speaker 4: I'm wondering.
• 27:38
  Speaker 7: I don't know. But you can't get tested. But the
• 27:41
  Speaker 7: thing is, what are you gonna do? You can't do
• 27:42
  Speaker 7: anything because uh, these little weird parasites cysts that end
• 27:46
  Speaker 7: up getting all over you. Not all over you, that's
• 27:48
  Speaker 7: an exaggeration, but they are. You can't take antabiotics for them.
• 27:54
  Speaker 7: So you're just gonna be that way.
• 27:55
  Speaker 4: So you're just gonna be.
• 27:57
  Speaker 6: So maybe you should go into u evilutionary biology like
• 28:01
  Speaker 6: your slow flager who's been studying this.
• 28:06
  Speaker 5: Start a club, yes, and wear sloppy outfits.
• 28:09
  Speaker 1: No.
• 28:09
  Speaker 7: No, As a woman, you would be dressed very nicely. Oh,
• 28:12
  Speaker 7: because he noticed that in all of his studies when
• 28:14
  Speaker 7: the women who were infected would come in to be tested,
• 28:16
  Speaker 7: they were all dressed like to the nines.
• 28:19
  Speaker 6: And men would come in all like, so okay, well
• 28:21
  Speaker 6: if his parasite could help me dress better, I mean,
• 28:25
  Speaker 6: all right, yeah, who knew? But then again, doesn't that
• 28:28
  Speaker 6: seem to be debunking the crazy cat lady stereotype, Because
• 28:33
  Speaker 6: so far, even with this parasite, even with the personality connections.
• 28:39
  Speaker 4: All that is.
• 28:40
  Speaker 6: All that I'm hearing is that women who own cats,
• 28:43
  Speaker 6: maybe to the extent that we are contracting parasites from them,
• 28:47
  Speaker 6: are well dressed, social, outgoing gals.
• 28:52
  Speaker 7: Yeah you know, well yeah, in the literal crazy I
• 28:57
  Speaker 7: have a parasite cat ladyway, maybe you're better off.
• 29:00
  Speaker 6: Yeah. I mean, if anything, this is an argument to
• 29:03
  Speaker 6: drop what you're doing, head to your nearest animal shelter
• 29:07
  Speaker 6: and pick up a kitten.
• 29:08
  Speaker 7: Oh yeah, yeah, I.
• 29:10
  Speaker 4: Wish I had a kitten right now.
• 29:12
  Speaker 7: I'm right now in the studio. I will admit I'm
• 29:14
  Speaker 7: more of a dog person, and this whole thing got
• 29:16
  Speaker 7: me a little scared about paraside.
• 29:19
  Speaker 6: Whereas I'm got totally gung ho for cats.
• 29:22
  Speaker 7: Now, okay, well, I really want to hear from our
• 29:26
  Speaker 7: cat lady listeners. Do you ever get accused of being
• 29:29
  Speaker 7: a cat lady? Are people very insensitive? How many cats
• 29:32
  Speaker 7: do you have?
• 29:33
  Speaker 6: Yeah?
• 29:34
  Speaker 5: Do children like my nephews approach you and.
• 29:40
  Speaker 6: Worry that your cat status and your dating status are
• 29:44
  Speaker 6: not looking too good?
• 29:45
  Speaker 7: Yeah, let's know your thoughts.
• 29:47
  Speaker 4: Mom.
• 29:48
  Speaker 6: Stuff at Discovery dot com is where you can email us,
• 29:52
  Speaker 6: And before we get into your emails, we have a
• 29:55
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• 29:59
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• 30:56
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• 31:02
  Speaker 5: And now back to you are letters.
• 31:08
  Speaker 7: And here we have an email from Melissa about our
• 31:11
  Speaker 7: sleepover podcast. She says, I went to a lot of
• 31:13
  Speaker 7: sleepover slash slumber parties when I was younger, but I'm
• 31:16
  Speaker 7: debating on whether I will let my own children have them.
• 31:19
  Speaker 7: Most of my slumber party experiences, the ones I can
• 31:22
  Speaker 7: still remember, didn't end well. My past sleepover experiences include
• 31:26
  Speaker 7: wetting the bed, getting the stomach fluent, throwing up, sleep walking,
• 31:29
  Speaker 7: and having horrific night tars that freaked out the parents
• 31:32
  Speaker 7: and children present. I even made a girl cry at one,
• 31:35
  Speaker 7: but that requires a backstory. Okay, here it is six
• 31:38
  Speaker 7: girls all agree that the first one to fall asleep
• 31:40
  Speaker 7: would get their sleeping bag tape to the floor. So
• 31:42
  Speaker 7: when the first girl fell asleep, I dutifully taped her
• 31:44
  Speaker 7: to the floor. This was followed by the girl waking
• 31:46
  Speaker 7: up and crying in a panic, calling her mom and
• 31:48
  Speaker 7: going home. Her mom made me apologize to her, which
• 31:52
  Speaker 7: was really embarrassing. So that does sound Yeah, you and Melissa,
• 31:56
  Speaker 7: You and I we did not have good slumber party experiences.
• 31:59
  Speaker 7: That's cool, it's all right, you know, just if your
• 32:02
  Speaker 7: child is ready, let them go.
• 32:05
  Speaker 6: Well, speaking of whether or not your child is ready,
• 32:08
  Speaker 6: I've got an email here from Julia about our episode
• 32:11
  Speaker 6: on kids and makeup, and she has a different perspective
• 32:17
  Speaker 6: and starts off, we need a social reform. All anyone
• 32:20
  Speaker 6: talks about is body image or what age is appropriate.
• 32:23
  Speaker 6: Nobody ever thinks about what's in the makeup, who it's
• 32:26
  Speaker 6: tested on, and the damage it does to your physical body.
• 32:29
  Speaker 6: There are animal sources and byproducts in makeup tested on
• 32:32
  Speaker 6: innocent animals, packaged and harmful plastics and are full of
• 32:35
  Speaker 6: chemicals that cause breakouts and aging. Nobody ever discusses this,
• 32:39
  Speaker 6: and if they do, they simply shrug off the facts
• 32:41
  Speaker 6: and continue to put on their face. There are ethical
• 32:44
  Speaker 6: makeup products, but they're expensive and not as saturated as
• 32:48
  Speaker 6: theyre harmful counterparts. If six year old girls saw some
• 32:51
  Speaker 6: of the rabbits I've seen with fur fallen out, bloody skin,
• 32:54
  Speaker 6: and rotten eyeballs, I'm sure they would feel more reluctant
• 32:57
  Speaker 6: about applying that makeup.
• 32:58
  Speaker 4: On their own skin.
• 33:00
  Speaker 6: Women don't care because they've already sold their soul to
• 33:02
  Speaker 6: their particular brands and consider makeup quote putting on their face.
• 33:07
  Speaker 6: As a teenager in high school, I couldn't recognize myself
• 33:09
  Speaker 6: in the mirror without a few layers of foundation, powder, eyeliner, eyeshadow.
• 33:12
  Speaker 4: And mascara.
• 33:13
  Speaker 6: I had a lot of acne problems and self esteem issues.
• 33:16
  Speaker 6: Now I rarely wear makeup, and if I do, it's handmade,
• 33:20
  Speaker 6: vegan and very very light. My skin is completely cleared up.
• 33:23
  Speaker 6: I find myself beautiful on a daily basis. I'm reducing
• 33:26
  Speaker 6: my harmful impact to the planet and animals, and I'm
• 33:29
  Speaker 6: saving a whole lot of money to boot, all.
• 33:32
  Speaker 5: Of which are pretty convincing arguments.
• 33:35
  Speaker 6: So thank you, Julia, and thank you to everyone who's
• 33:38
  Speaker 6: written in mom Stuff at Discovery dot Com is our
• 33:41
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• 33:44
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• 33:47
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• 33:50
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• 33:54
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• 33:56
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• 34:03
  Speaker 4: On this and thousands of other topics.
• 34:05
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