Where did you say it was?

“You cut my dog’s balls off, you cut my balls off!” said a man last night on It’s Me or the Dog (I don’t have a dog, but that programme makes me laugh so much… and I’m always wondering whether I can pick up some tip I could try on my cat – some hope, eh?) He was the owner of a cute bulldog who terrorized one of his sons (the man’s, not the dog’s) and humped everyone constantly. Non-stop. He even tried (the dog, not the man) to mate with the presenter (a lovely, stern dog dominatrix) and the sound recordist (is that a word?) on camera, in front of millions of viewers, the shameless mutt. The solution for such macho behaviour was castration – obviously. The dog tamer explained that it was cruel for the poor beast to be pumped full of testosterone all the time with no way of releasing his sex drive. but the owner wouldn’t hear of it. No way!

How interesting! (It’s also preposterous and laughable, but that goes without saying so I won’t say it.) So, if I understand correctly, that man’s virility resides in his dog’s testicles. (He’s not the only man to have said that kind of nonsense on that programme, by the way.) Hmmm… let me see: I had my pussycat spayed a few years ago; I love my cat and sometimes identify with her, but I didn’t feel as if my uterus and ovaries had been removed. Why is that? Because… my femaleness was not in my cat’s reproductive organs. It wasn’t even in my own breasts, which were cut off a while ago. (My cat also had ‘multiple’ mastectomies when she was a kitten. Mine was just a ‘double’ – sounds like I’m ordering a drink, doesn’t it? “Make mine a double, please, surgeon!”, although the Cromwell Hospital did try to charge me – and my insurance company – for three breasts. Hey, I’m weird, but not that weird.) I know that some women feel less feminine when they’ve had a hysterectomy, for instance, but at least they’re talking about the loss of their own organs not that of their hamster’s or parrot’s.

I cannot quite understand that man’s reasoning (so what else is new?). It’s long been suspected, though, that men see their pets – and their cars – as extensions of their manhood, hasn’t it? What better proof does one need?

Slapping those morons who would rather jeopardize their marriages (the man’s wife was very pissed off) than do the right thing for their pets!