I have been slowly befriending one of the local cats that comes into our garden sometimes.
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this is why cats seem to gravitate towards the one person in a room who doesn’t like cats. it isn’t spite or contrariness! it’s just that the cat-disliking person ISN’T BOTHERING THEM.
cats often find human behaviour confusing! but a human sitting there minding their own business and not looking at them is honestly pretty cat behaviour, and thus comprehensible to them as “relaxed, predictable, not being weird or threatening”
@astronomerritt @riley yep! I was at a friend's house for the first time so I introduced myself to her cat and then walked away. Everyone else was petting and cooing and just basically in his face. He tolerated it for a bit then left the room. He came back in about half an hour later and sat down next to me which I was told he *never* did and I'm sure it was because I interacted on cat terms. (Cat terms seem to be autistic terms, which tracks!)
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Making friends with cats is mostly about proving that you’re safe and then just not bothering them. Cats tend to like me and I swear at least 80% of this is that I respect their boundaries.
@astronomerritt and obediently follow their wishes when called
Cats are bossy. Once you accept who's chief it's alright 
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one more fun fact about cats:
in South Korea, cat lovers are called 집사 or jibsa, which can be translated as “butler”.
we’re cat butlers. feels accurate!
@astronomerritt absolutely right!
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@astronomerritt occasionally cats completely reject this and are just like HELLO YES PLAY WITH ME. there was a local one we nicknamed socks who ran up to me in the street and let me pick him up and give him fuss. no slow blink timid approach stuff, just right in with the hugs. we moved and I still miss him.
@gsuberland @astronomerritt I have foster cat who adores people. Any people. He leaps into the arms of total strangers and licks their cheeks. In fact, he did that with a team of paramedics and firefighters who were here for a medical emergency. The firefighters were delighted and all whipped out their phones to take photos. (My own cats were all under the bed, naturally.)
Unfortunately, that cat hates other cats. -
@Haikyoneko @gsuberland Yeah, my whole point is that you have to interact with a cat on the cat’s terms, which is something many humans are bad at. My parents’ girl cat is very sociable, in a polite way where she will give one civil and pleasant headbutt to anyone who comes into her house.
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@gsuberland @astronomerritt I have foster cat who adores people. Any people. He leaps into the arms of total strangers and licks their cheeks. In fact, he did that with a team of paramedics and firefighters who were here for a medical emergency. The firefighters were delighted and all whipped out their phones to take photos. (My own cats were all under the bed, naturally.)
Unfortunately, that cat hates other cats.@LPerry2 I feel like all of the most human-sociable cats I’ve met dislike other cats. My parents’ girl cat likes humans a lot, even strangers, but she has absolutely no tolerance for her own brother.
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@ska I’ve tried, but I think dogs are too smart: they can tell it isn’t my natural behaviour. It isn’t that they dislike me! They mostly seem to find me non-threatening but uninteresting. Like furniture.
Once I’ve spent some time with a dog and it’s gotten used to me then we get on fine. My best friend’s dog is my lil buddy. -
@LPerry2 I feel like all of the most human-sociable cats I’ve met dislike other cats. My parents’ girl cat likes humans a lot, even strangers, but she has absolutely no tolerance for her own brother.
@astronomerritt Hm. I've fostered a couple hundred cats over the years, so I have a fairly good sample. I've had cats that love people and are okay with cats, and cats that love people and hate cats. But what I have noticed is that cats seem to bond with just one other cat. Even if they are okay with a bunch of cats, they are only friends with one. Period. If that one cat dies or leaves, the remaining cat never bonds with another.
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@astronomerritt Hm. I've fostered a couple hundred cats over the years, so I have a fairly good sample. I've had cats that love people and are okay with cats, and cats that love people and hate cats. But what I have noticed is that cats seem to bond with just one other cat. Even if they are okay with a bunch of cats, they are only friends with one. Period. If that one cat dies or leaves, the remaining cat never bonds with another.
@LPerry2 Oooh, well, you’d definitely know better than me! My first two cats were bonded littermates and when one died the other was never quite the same and showed absolutely no interest in any other cat, so my experience tallies as far as one data point goes
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@astronomerritt @riley yep! I was at a friend's house for the first time so I introduced myself to her cat and then walked away. Everyone else was petting and cooing and just basically in his face. He tolerated it for a bit then left the room. He came back in about half an hour later and sat down next to me which I was told he *never* did and I'm sure it was because I interacted on cat terms. (Cat terms seem to be autistic terms, which tracks!)
@akamran Cats and autistic people share many similarities, I think! I’ve said this today already
They hate eye contact, communicate very honestly, enjoy dim cosy enclosed spaces, have strong preferences and boundaries, dislike disruptions to their routine, and are often mistakenly assumed to be cold or rude by people who don’t understand them and can’t be bothered trying. -
@astronomerritt imo the whole "don't make eye contact, just ignore them, make soothing noises if they come closer" is a pretty solid approach with dogs as well. At the very least, let the dog come to you first. I mostly ignore other dogs in dog parks unless they come say hi and I've had totally strange dogs come to me for safety when things get a bit too rowdy
I think people very often assume that all dogs love every human being they come across, if not instantly, then after they've had a little sniff, when obviously that's not true. I have two rescue galgos (aka spanish greyhounds) and they are quite fearful of people in general, and so far haven't really grown to like any friend or relative etc of ours (we've had them for about three years now). Entirely possible that they will be aloof at best towards strangers for the rest of their lives. Before these two, I had a smooth collie and she was also often pretty meh about people. Particularly if you were rude with your introductions, which people quite often are with dogs too imo. Most of them just tolerate it with no obvious complaints because they do love humans
@kskehu Dogs definitely find me non-threatening, even anxious dogs. They just also find me quite boring. Like furniture.
Generally, though, if I know a dog for long enough, they will figure me out and decide we are buddies after all. Dogs are clever. -
I only want them to decide they want nothing to do with me but still with the disgusting attempts to lick me. Ew.
@stevegis_ssg I don’t enjoy being licked by dogs and I don’t understand why I’m supposed to be happy about it. And I LIKE dogs!
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@astronomerritt I'm allergic to cats, and my experience is that *cats absolutely love me*. I'm convinced that this is precisely because they very quickly clock me as "rare giant ape who *doesn't* harass me".
@datarama Exactly. People seem to think cats hone in on allergic folk out of spite but it’s just that you’re often the chillest monkeys in the room with them.
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@kskehu Dogs definitely find me non-threatening, even anxious dogs. They just also find me quite boring. Like furniture.
Generally, though, if I know a dog for long enough, they will figure me out and decide we are buddies after all. Dogs are clever.@astronomerritt yeah I think my dogs would love it if everyone was very boring and furniture-like 🥲
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@astronomerritt
Ejem, ejem, @isaactly_s ...@missbrainslug OMG gracias! Me ha encantado. Sí, sí: soy su mayordomo 🥰
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one more fun fact about cats:
in South Korea, cat lovers are called 집사 or jibsa, which can be translated as “butler”.
we’re cat butlers. feels accurate!
it is indeed true, have a look here (Mr Ha was just a former University professor who decided to downshift to running a fish farm, and ended up befriending feral cats)
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one more fun fact about cats:
in South Korea, cat lovers are called 집사 or jibsa, which can be translated as “butler”.
we’re cat butlers. feels accurate!
@astronomerritt My last cat was a British Longhair tom called Prince, he died a year ago. I liked to refer to him as His Furry Highness the Prince and to myself as his butler.
Well, my new cat is called Momo, she is about a year old now (her actual birthday is unknown since she was found in a box as a kitten), and apparently I'm still the butler. -
@astronomerritt ex adopted a big boy kitty like that, purred loudly when picked up, but he—apparently—hated it. He also hated other cats and could not be added to her parents’ clowder, which already included one cat who was DNI (she was so fluffy, but I did manage to control myself around that traumatized cat). I hope he eventually found a home where he could just be happy and alone most of the time.
@astronomerritt he couldn’t be part of their all-black clowder because he hated other cats. We thought he was making progress at one point because he was on the other side of the glass door from one of the other cats for a minute or so, but then he punched the glass like a little psycho.
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