Black Cat Appreciation Day

[vilakins]

Apparently it was Black Cat Appreciation Day yesterday (17th) in the US. They're adopted last there (my Sebastian, shown here, was at the Lonely Miaow months after his sibs, but that may have been shyness) and are five times more likely to be put to sleep at shelters in the US because of this, but why? Stupid superstition? [Edit: yes, apparently, they're regarded as bad luck there.] Going by the black cats I've known, they're stunningly beautiful, sweet-natured, and so loving and faithful. Adopting Sebastian was one of the best decisions I've made.


Just after we adopted him


In a snuggler


In the garden

What's not to love?

Comments

[kalypso]

How strange! I'd never heard that people didn't like black cats - who wouldn't want a good luck symbol around them all the time?

[vilakins]

Apparently some people think they're bad luck. A friend in Ely with two lovely black girls said someone asked her how she could have black cats. I've always loved their magnificent glossiness and friendly personalities.

Another theory proposed on FB is that you can't see their expressions easily, but I certainly can. I think it's the US where they're so disliked, but certainly Sebastian was at the foster home a while. Anyway, I've found homes for two rescues I'd have kept if Tessa and Claudia would have let me, and finally I have one, so I've shown my appreciation.

[capri0mni]

Yes.... That's an American thing. In American folklore black cats are exclusively bad luck, and even seen by some as the Devil in disguise.

Ironically, it comes from the same root in folklore: Black cats were seen as companions to the goddess Hecate (though before the Greeks got to Egypt, it was black rabbits), who was goddess of roads and highways. So if a black cat was walking alongside the road, in the same direction you were, that was a sign that good luck was ahead. But if a black cat crosses your path, than that means bad luck is ahead.

So... Some cultures kept the first half of that belief, and hold that black cats are good luck... But Americans kept the second half, and expanded it, so now, the belief is that a black cat crossing your path causes bad luck, rather than just warns of it...

Then again, some of the first American settlers were Puritans, who thought all association with magic and luck is evil, so that was probably a factor in the belief's evolution.

[vilakins]

I'm glad it's mainly the US. That's yet another custom (valentine's day and halloween are others) I do not want to see imported more than they are already. [rolls eyes]