The story of Kunkush, the white agora cat from Iraq who was reunited with his family after having got separated when they fled from Iraq to Norway, was a big hit. Many newspapers published it, and some media even posted the video of the tearful reunion on internet, collecting many hundreds of thousands of hits. Kunkush’s fate touched many hearts, starting with those who found him, those who searched for his owners and reunited them, and finally those who heard the story. Even though it was an emotional story, of getting lost and being found, it still raises a general question: why do stories about animals have this effect, whilst those about people are often ignored? The American magazine Newsweek last December devoted part of an article on the 150 stray cats of Aleppo and their care taker Mohammad Alaa Aljaleel, who daily feeds them. ‘I regard animals and humans in the same light,’ he said to Newsweek. ‘All of them suffer pain, and all of them deserve compassion.’ This reminds me of the European organisation that is collecting money to feed the cats in the war torn Syrian city of Aleppo. As many animals are left behind when their owners flee, this group wants to prevent them from dying of hunger. At the same time, people are still living in the city, often because they could not afford to leave, or because they did not have any place to go to. As rebel groups and government military battle around them, they need help. Instead of looking after them, the cats get the care. I am a cat lover. My two cats are very dear to me and like many of my friends I love watching cat videos. Thus I perfectly understand many people have fled the war with their pet, like the owners of Kunkush, and why they considered their animal part of the family. I would not leave my cats behind either. I also understand that aid is needed for animals in war zones, because the stray dogs and cats may become a danger to humans, carrying disease or even attacking them. But I have a hard time understanding why so many people’s hearts soften more for the fate of animals than for that of humans. Why so often stories about animals suffering touch them more than those about people being the victim of wars fought by humans. It seems that the suffering of the Syrian city of Madaya, which for months was cut off from the outside world by troops of the Syrian president Assad, only really reached the world when word came out that the inhabitants had started to eat their cats and dogs. Stories of refugees leaving war torn regions like Iraq, Syria and Afghanistan hardly make it into the main stream media anymore. There are too many, and they are no longer considered news. But feed people stories about animals, and they will consume them eagerly. All journalists know this. Some news programs even add a daily bit of ‘animal’ sandwiched in between the hard news – to keep the viewers watching. The new birth of a giraffe, the continuing story of the Chinese panda’s, the killing of swans, they all catch the attention, whilst stories about refugees waiting desperately in the cold and rain at closed border crossings in Europe hardly do. So many people zap away or turn the page. I’d like to hear the opinion of a psychiatrist about this. Is it perhaps because the animal stories keep our attention away from the real, hard world that we cannot control? But it goes far beyond the news. In Europe we have perfectly run animal shelters, where people can go to choose their healthy, vaccinated and nurtured new pet. Stray animals are caught and cared for. And at the same time refugee camps are overfull and stretched to the limit, whilst local people are complaining and protesting about strangers invading their territory. Refugees that are denied an asylum end up as illegal in the streets, and resort to the few shelters run by churches or NGOs struggling to survive for lack of finance. When people hear of desperate young men on the way to Europe who are protesting angrily against the closed borders, they just shake their heads in disgust and say: ‘Surely refugees don’t act that way?’ And yet a neglected animal that has gone wild, can still count on their compassion, to such a degree that they rather accept it to be caught and put in a cage, than to have it killed. When did we reach this stage, that the behaviour of animals is better understood and accepted than that of humans? That their fate touches our hearts, and those of humans leave us cold? As the cat carer in Aleppo said: All of them suffer pain, and all of them deserve compassion. The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the position of Rudaw.
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