Cat Food

Advertisers are insidious. It's a given of western capitalist society that somebody trying to make a sale will stop at nothing to push their product. We've all lived with this situation for so long now that some ideas have become naturalised and taken for granted.

Take cat food, as an example. It may look and smell the same as cat sick but here is a product which has it's supposed virtues extolled as the most natural thing in the world for your moggy to eat. Now, I'm sure that it is the most convenient and possibly nutritiously beneficial thing the domestic cat could wish for, but natural? I don't think so!

Just take a look at the flavours on offer; beef for example. Now I know cats can be vicious buggers when they want to, but I have yet to see one stalk and take-out a fully grown Friesian. It would be difficult enough for your average moggy to do more than produce a slight ankle irritation before being trampled to death. This is before considering the difficulty of dragging the thing through hedges and over walls. The dilemma of the cat-flap would be truly fun to watch though.

Tuna is another example. A fish that can grow to such huge proportions seems a most unlikely prey for Fluffy or Tiddles. The same could be said of any sea fish really. The whole lack-of-opposable-thumbs issue always gets in the way when cats want to go sea fishing. Assuming they can hire a boat of course.

The alternative flavours of "Mouse Morsels" or perhaps "Sparrow Special" may cause queasiness in the aisles of the supermarkets, but on reflection is it really any more disgusting than chicken or pilchard? It would be one small step closer to the ultimate goal of product and advertising realism; red ink should be used in panty-pad adverts. But that's another story entirely.