I think the neighbors stole my cat and ate him!

[Darth Mandarb]

It's perfectly logical for Rick to consider his [country of origin] neighbor a suspect in this disappearance.  If a human being went missing ALL suspects would be considered, not just the ones that wouldn't offend somebody's racial or political sensitivities.  Tuqu is, based on Rick's emotional message, a member of the family and as such warrants as much attention as the search for a missing person.  This being the case it's logical to consider his neighbor from a cat-eating culture a suspect.  It's not fear mongering.  It's logical deduction.

Sure; cats wander off from time to time (as I and others have already stated and I find the most probable situation here) but that fact doesn't immediately exclude the possbility of foul play.  Rick isn't basing the subject or premise of this thread on whimsy or a knee-jerk reaction.  As always his post is extremely thorough and well thought out (if a tad more emotional than usual which, given the context, is understandable).  If he had said, "Man my neighbor is Chinese/Korean/Whatever and those people eat cats so I know he ate my cat" then I could justify calling it fear of "scary foreigners" but that's not what he said.  He shared his thoughts of his investigation into the disappearance of a family member and his conclusions/suspicions thus far.

Me personally?  I find it highly unlikely the this neighbor would have done such a horrible thing but that doesn't mean he didn't and should just be excluded as a potential suspect.

If a convicted rapist lived in the neighborhood, and a girl was raped in the same neighborhood, would you exclude the known rapist as a suspect simply 'cause he happened to be of a different race than the police detective?  No, because that would be stupid. 

A cat has gone missing and there's a neighbor in close proximity who not only hales from a culture that eat cats but has also raised some suspicions in the past.  It's logical to consider him a suspect.  Again before people go all PC on me I'm not saying the guy did it, I'm saying it warrants looking into.  If a family member of mine went missing I'd investigate EVERY possible lead and people's lame-ass sensitivities be damned.

All that aside ...

Rick?  Any word?

[Snake]

I second what Darth said. Before Duals' made the first post I had already figured it would turn into such a thing at some point. How can it not?

I've never met Rick, but I do know him enough from here on the forums and personal messages to know that he's pretty damn smart. Actually, he's the smartest person I've ever had the privilege of knowing.

He's not jumping to conclusions or blindly pointing fingers saying, "HEY! The neighbor's from a country that eats cats! I bet it was him!!1!". He's obviously written a sort of check list with all the possibilities he could think of, ruling them out one by one. Now, judging from the evidence he's gathered, he's concerned that this guy could be a serious possibility, hence posting here.

Go easy on the guy.

[Calin Leafshade]

This being the case it's logical to consider his neighbor from a cat-eating culture a suspect.  It's not fear mongering.  It's logical deduction.

It's racial (or at least cultural) profiling. Surely its the equivilent of blaming a black guy for a crime because on average the black population commits more crime that the white population (in the US at least).

Remember Rick has no evidence (beyond tenuous circumstantial stuff) that his neighbour even eats cats, nevermind steals them from people so your rapist analogy falls down.

With that aside I am very much a cat lover (owning two) and so I hope that your cat is safe and happy wherever he may be.

[Darth Mandarb]

It's racial (or at least cultural) profiling. Surely its the equivilent of blaming a black guy for a crime because on average the black population commits more crime that the white population (in the US at least).Remember Rick has no evidence (beyond tenuous circumstantial stuff) that his neighbour even eats cats, nevermind steals them from people so your rapist analogy falls down.

I've never understood how we have (in the modern world) let logic take a back seat to political correctness.  I can't speak for the "ratio" of the race of criminals in the U.S. but if a shepherd loses 20 sheep a year to wolves and 1 to coyote isn't it logical for him to conclude, when he loses a sheep, that it was a wolf that done it?  It's not species-racism or profiling ... it's law of averages and deductive reasoning.

I find my analogy completely valid.  The cops would be fired from the force if they overlooked the convicted rapist in the neighborhood as a suspect simply because they were afraid of being accused of profiling.

If the guy on the other side of the suspected neighbor was from a culture that revered cats and would never harm them, would it be "profiling" to rule him out as a suspect?  Of course not (though I'd probably investigate him anyway but I don't trust anybody (white, black, red, green, yellow, blue, orange or wolf)).

Circumstantial evidence is still evidence.  It warrants looking into (if Rick suspects foul-play).  I'm not there.  I don't know the neighbor or the past situations.  But I "know" Rick and he wouldn't have posted this if he didn't have reason to suspect it.  In light of that I feel he's justified in investigating this neighbor further.

Still, I'm just arguing the point that it's valid to investigate this guy.  Personally (as I've said a few times already) I doubt this guy had a part.  I find it more likely, if foul-play was committed, that it was some little punk in the neighborhood just being a little punk (race of "punk" unspecified ... just to appease anybody who might think I meant a black kid).

Anyway ... this is getting off the topic of this thread and I apologize to Rick for my part in that.

[Squinky]

Truthfully, I doubt that even if one could prove the neighbor ate the cat, that any criminal charges could actually stick.

Most likely you could sue the guy in Civil court though, perhaps your neighborhood has covenants or some other rules you could use against him if you had hard evidience of the crime.

Hopefully this resolves itself, but there are also some pet GPS options. It could help if it happened again.

[Ryan Timothy B]

I've never understood how we have (in the modern world) let logic take a back seat to political correctness.  I can't speak for the "ratio" of the race of criminals in the U.S. but if a shepherd loses 20 sheep a year to wolves and 1 to coyote isn't it logical for him to conclude, when he loses a sheep, that it was a wolf that done it?  It's not species-racism or profiling ... it's law of averages and deductive reasoning.

One difference. Your point doesn't have any weight in this argument at all. Because 19 of the 20 cats that ran away and didn't return were more than likely hit by a car or adopted by families who thought it was a stray. Who's to say the 1 cat not in that statistic didn't return because a man from a foreign country, that happens to eat cats, ate it. Doesn't mean he eats cats or has ever eaten a cat. That in itself is racial profiling.

The whole 'convicted' rapist argument is that he's actually convicted. He's been proven guilty of raping someone. It's not that he lives in the same house as a convicted rapist -- it's that he's actually done it himself and been found guilty.

This foreign man hasn't been caught in his backyard slow roasting a cat on a spitfire. He just happens to live in a country that doesn't outlaw the slaughtering and eating of cats.

I find my analogy completely valid.  The cops would be fired from the force if they overlooked the convicted rapist in the neighborhood as a suspect simply because they were afraid of being accused of profiling.

Again. Racial Profiling. Convicted VS the prejudged notion that this man eats cats because of his unfortunate cat-eating laws of his home country.

As Calin basically said, if something was stolen, should the cops start breaking down black people's doors because they have a higher percentage of theft than white people? Your argument is that he's a convicted rapist, which outweighs any racial or statistical chance and probability.



I was talking to Ben304 one day on messenger and I asked him if he lived with kangaroos and crocodiles jumping and crawling around in his backyard. It just so happens that he's never even seen a crocodile in the wild. I haven't been to Australia nor have I seen many videos of it. I was merely basing it on my preconceived notion that every Australian lived like Steve Irwin; the crocodile hunter.

Your basing your believe that this man eats cats because there might actually be 5 restaurants in his country (completely hypothetical) that actually serve it.

[Darth Mandarb]

Guys ... seriously.  I didn't say the neighbor ate the cat (several times I've said I doubt he did).

My point does have "weight" though because you drew the wrong conclusion from it.  If you want to relate my wolves/sheep analogy to Rick's situation it would be "if 20 cats were eaten in a year and 19 of them were eaten by this neighbor and 1 was by a dog it would be logical to think the neighbor did it".  The premise of my analogy was that the 'foul play' is confirmed, not just the suspicion of it.  It was based on Calin's "black/white crime ratio" argument anyway and not missing cats.

Again. Racial Profiling. Convicted VS the prejudged notion that this man eats cats because of his unfortunate cat-eating laws of his home country.

So you're saying that in ALL cases (strong/weak evidence doesn't matter) racial profiling should be avoided?  Cops, Investigators and Detectives should ignore all clues or ideas that they might draw based on race?  By that reasoning you'd agree that if a person from a society that eats humans moves into the neighborhood and people start vanishing they should just ignore the guy from the society that eats people 'cause, really, we wouldn't want to racially profile him?

Cop 1, "that guy comes from a society that eats people... but his skin is a different color than ours!"
Cop 2, "well then he couldn't have done it!"

The cat is missing, Rick suspects foul-play, he should investigate all angles; even if that includes a neighbor of a different skin color.  Logical.

It doesn't have to be a racist thing but now-a-days that's the first thing everybody immediately jumps to in some sense of ... what?  Enlightenment?  A need to seem cultural and wise?  What if the guy was from [cat-eating country] but was white?  His (white) American parents had moved to [cat eating country] and he was born/raised there and moved to the states later in life.  Would it be okay to consider him a suspect then?

I would like to point out that Rick never said the guy wasn't white.

[Snake]

...but if a shepherd loses 20 sheep a year to wolves and 1 to coyote...

...Because 19 of the 20 cats that ran away and didn't return were more than likely hit by a car...

...if 20 cats were eaten in a year and 19 of them were eaten by this neighbor and 1 was by a dog it would be logical to think the neighbor did it...

I'm starting to think that Rick just wanted us to do fucking word problems

[SSH]

Northern Chinese consider the whole cat-eating thing as "a southern problem". Quite possibly Southerners would say "Oh, that just happens in Sichuan" (or wherever, I only choose that as the only southern province that I can recall). In any case, its not exactly a culture thing, probably more an "avoiding starvation" thing.

Obviously, prejudice against poor people is just fine

[Calin Leafshade]

Darth, you're missing the point. No one has said you should avoid suspecting someone due to race or culture but merely that you shouldn't suspect someone solely because of it.

Also you have to understand that there is a difference between it being culturally acceptable to eat cats and stealing cats to eat them.

*if* this guy had a previous record of eating cats and had been convicted (like your rapist) then feel free to apportion suspicion in his direction. However, you can't accuse him of theft just because some of his countrymen happen to like eating cats.

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

This being the case it's logical to consider his neighbor from a cat-eating culture a suspect.  It's not fear mongering.  It's logical deduction.

This is so flawed I find it difficult to believe that you wrote it, Darth.  It's along the same lines as having a salmon pond and immediately turning to your japanese neighbors when one goes missing just because you 'know' the japanese love fish; without any evidence beyond a generally-believed stereotype you're walking into very dangerous and unhealthy paranoia territory.  I'm not saying it's impossible or could never be true, but suspecting the worst of another person because of a cultural predilection is just racism of the worst kind and using a word like logic to support a view or a feeling is pretty terrible. 

Granted, if there is significant EVIDENCE (coming from a country where something is done is NOT evidence, or at best is purely circumstantial) that a neighbor is a thief or you have seen them in your yard around your pets or goods then you have reasonable cause to be suspicious, but going back to the cat eating issue it's just such a wild claim that, short of catching him in the act of trespassing or professing a desire to eat cats or an admission that he has done so recently, you've got no grounds for suspicion beyond xenophobia.

Please understand, my goal here is not to insult anyone but this suspicion based on cultural background thing is absolutely ludicrous and should not be defended by any rational person.  It's xenophobia plain and simple until and unless some real evidence can be shown.

This is the sort of thing that makes me worry that Homeland Security's move to turn the fear of terrorism inward on Americans through their PSA's encouraging us to spy on one another via the 'Report Suspicious Activity' propaganda will succeed because there are people out there with suspicious minds that will quickly point fingers at their fellow man with the merest shred of a hint of a reason, like that man who turned in his neighbor a few weeks back for carrying a 'suspicious' package indoors (it was a labeled UPS package!).

[Darth Mandarb]

Darth, you're missing the point...

...Also you have to understand that there is a difference between it being culturally acceptable to eat cats and stealing cats to eat them.

*if* this guy had a previous record of eating cats and had been convicted (like your rapist) then feel free to apportion suspicion in his direction. However, you can't accuse him of theft just because some of his countrymen happen to like eating cats.

I think it is not I who is missing the point.

I never accused this neighbor (or claimed he should be accused).  I contend (and stand-by) that there is enough evidence to warrant looking into his potential involvement further.  A suspicion of guilt is not an accusation. I didn't say he did it (again, again, and again I've said I doubt he did).  But you don't overlook any connection in a matter (a disappearance) like this.  No matter how circumstantial.

No one has said you should avoid suspecting someone due to race or culture but merely that you shouldn't suspect someone solely because of it.

Let's make a white example here (since that's not likely to offend anybody).  A member of the KKK lives in the neighborhood and racial slurs are spray-painted on a [non-white] person's house and the cops are called to find out who did it.  Now, by your (and other's) "logic", because that KKK member has never been convicted of a crime (and might appear to be an upstanding member of the community aside from his connection to the culture of hate that is the KKK) the cops should ignore the fact that he is a member of the KKK and not investigate his possible involvement in the case?  They shouldn't suspect him solely on his connection to the KKK?

This is so flawed I find it difficult to believe that you wrote it, Darth.  It's along the same lines as having a salmon pond and immediately turning to your japanese neighbors when one goes missing just because you 'know' the japanese love fish; without any evidence beyond a generally-believed stereotype you're walking into very dangerous and unhealthy paranoia territory.  I'm not saying it's impossible or could never be true, but suspecting the worst of another person because of a cultural predilection is just racism of the worst kind and using a word like logic to support a view or a feeling is pretty terrible.

That makes no sense.  I honestly don't know how to reply to that.  So we should pass a new law/policy to all police, detectives, investigators and people in general that if you feel a crime has been committed you should ignore ALL possible connections and only investigate people of the same race/culture as you?  Let a criminal get away with something just to avoid offending cultural sensitivities?

"Well the neighbor is a suspect but we don't have any [insert culture] people on the force so we can't look into him!"

And you think I can't apply the word logic to my statements?

Granted, if there is significant EVIDENCE (coming from a country where something is done is NOT evidence, or at best is purely circumstantial) that a neighbor is a thief or you have seen them in your yard around your pets or goods then you have reasonable cause to be suspicious, but going back to the cat eating issue it's just such a wild claim that, short of catching him in the act of trespassing or professing a desire to eat cats or an admission that he has done so recently, you've got no grounds for suspicion beyond xenophobia.

So your contention is that if a crime has been committed (or even just suspected) ALL cases should just be dropped if you don't have significant evidence?  A crime should never be investigated on circumstantial evidence?  That's so flawed I find it difficult to believe you wrote it.

A cat has gone missing, a person in the neighborhood has a connection to a culture that eats cats.  While it is FAR more likely the cat simply wandered off the potential for foul-play still exists. This isn't rocket science.  The guy may find the notion of eating cats deplorable and might even be a cat-lover ... but you wouldn't know that unless you looked into him to discover that and then rule him out as a suspect.

But to ignore him as a potential suspect because of words like racism, xenophobia, dangerous territory, etc is just plain illogical.

To jump to the conclusion that I'm accusing him (even though I never accused him) is illogical.

To jump to the conclusion that I'm racially profiling the guy (or succumbing to any form of racism) is silly.  Maybe you're assuming I'm racially profiling 'cause I'm white?   Maybe it's not me who is racially profiling here....

I can tell this is one of those issue that is just going to go back and forth.  What I (and all the people I've discussed this with outside the forms (not all white, just to clarify)) see as "logic" others (here) see as racism and other such popular buzz-words.  I'm not going to clog up this thread anymore.

[Intense Degree]

I never accused this neighbor (or claimed he should be accused).  I contend (and stand-by) that there is enough evidence to warrant looking into his potential involvement further.  A suspicion of guilt is not an accusation. I didn't say he did it (again, again, and again I've said I doubt he did).  But you don't overlook any connection in a matter (a disappearance) like this.  No matter how circumstantial.

But with respect you have missed the point once again. There is no evidence that this neighbour eats cats, and there is, to my mind, nothing to suggest that he is any more likely to than any of the other neighbours. Why then should his potential involvement be looked into further? You could fabricate connections with any of the other neighbours but this would not make them worthy of investigation.

Let's make a white example here (since that's not likely to offend anybody).  A member of the KKK lives in the neighborhood and racial slurs are spray-painted on a [non-white] person's house and the cops are called to find out who did it.  Now, by your (and other's) "logic", because that KKK member has never been convicted of a crime (and might appear to be an upstanding member of the community aside from his connection to the culture of hate that is the KKK) the cops should ignore the fact that he is a member of the KKK and not investigate his possible involvement in the case?  They shouldn't suspect him solely on his connection to the KKK?

No offence Darth, but are you deliberately misunderstanding the point here? You specify the guy in your example as "a member of the KKK" and therefore that is what he is (in your example). How can you specify the neighbour in the situation at hand as a "cat eater"? Being a member of the KKK plainly pins a person's colours to the mast in terms of race, in a way that coming from a country in which some people eat cats does not do in terms of feline cuisine!

If this guy was definitely a "cat eater", legal convictions or no, then your point would, of course, hold water. As there is no meaningful suggestion that he does, other than the vaguest speculation, it does not work.

[Snarky]

I never accused this neighbor (or claimed he should be accused).  I contend (and stand-by) that there is enough evidence to warrant looking into his potential involvement further.  A suspicion of guilt is not an accusation. I didn't say he did it (again, again, and again I've said I doubt he did).  But you don't overlook any connection in a matter (a disappearance) like this.  No matter how circumstantial.

I went back and looked over Rick's post again, and I don't see that there's any evidence to warrant looking into this neighbor specifically. There's a confusing story that maybe he was keeping rabbits as livestock? (It's unclear to me whether this is definitely referring to the same person, and whether that was definitely what was going on.) And that he comes from a country where eating cats is "very prevalent" (according to Wikipedia, no such country exists; cats are eaten in Korea, for medicinal purposes, not as a regular food item, in China, but only regularly in Guangdong province, and according to some sources in Vietnam, but that is disputed). Oh, and cats have gone missing from the area before. (Cats go missing from all areas; without more information it's impossible to tell whether there is really a cluster of cat-disappearances close to this guy's house.)

Let's make a white example here (since that's not likely to offend anybody).  A member of the KKK lives in the neighborhood and racial slurs are spray-painted on a [non-white] person's house and the cops are called to find out who did it.  Now, by your (and other's) "logic", because that KKK member has never been convicted of a crime (and might appear to be an upstanding member of the community aside from his connection to the culture of hate that is the KKK) the cops should ignore the fact that he is a member of the KKK and not investigate his possible involvement in the case?  They shouldn't suspect him solely on his connection to the KKK?

I don't see how you can fail to spot the mistake in that analogy. It's more like if the neighbor came from the deep South, so based on (fact-based, historically speaking) stereotypes of southerners, and no actual evidence, he might be a KKK member, and so he should be singled out for investigation.

That makes no sense.  I honestly don't know how to reply to that.  So we should pass a new law/policy to all police, detectives, investigators and people in general that if you feel a crime has been committed you should ignore ALL possible connections and only investigate people of the same race/culture as you?  Let a criminal get away with something just to avoid offending cultural sensitivities?

"Well the neighbor is a suspect but we don't have any [insert culture] people on the force so we can't look into him!"

What the hell, Darth? It's not that belonging to some group means they can't be investigated. It's that they shouldn't be investigated just for belonging to that group, especially when there's nothing firm indicating the group is more prone to the particular crime in question. It's pretty simple, just do the thought experiment: if the person under the same circumstances, facing the same evidence, was, say, white, would there be grounds for investigation? (Not that you have to be blind to potential cultural factors in providing motive, of course. Let's say that remains of a cat were found that had been cooked and eaten. Then coming from a culture where cats are consumed would be a reason to focus suspicion.)

[Kweepa]

Surely, Fox News style, the title of this thread should be changed to "Did my neighbor eat my cat?"

Here are the possibilities I am fairly confident that can be eliminated:
=================================================
1. He was not hit by a car.  Check nearby streets and animal control about DOAs.

2. Has not killed by a dog.  There was no sign of blood, fur, or other indications of such a struggle.

3. He was not frightened away and too scared to come home.

4. He did not wander off and forget how to get back home.

WTF? Absence of evidence allows you to eliminate these possibilities, despite their being (in my opinion) much more likely than "this guy looks like the guy that used to live in this house that ate rabbits, so he must steal and eat cats." In the case of 3 and 4, there's not even any rational explanation for your dismissal.

I think the most likely explanation is this:

I took our other cat outside on a leash

I hope your kitty comes home safely, but lay off the xenophobia. This is an international forum!

(I considered not posting this, but I wanted to voice my distaste for the thought process. )

[Matti]

(I considered not posting this, but I wanted to voice my distaste for the thought process. )

Same here. I don't think the statet possibilities can be eliminated, instead they're rather likely. "Investigating further" on that guy because of the country where he's coming from is disgusting xenophobia and nothing more. Nothing. And I hope Darth got the point by now and understands that his analogies were not only weak, but totally out of place.

There's a reason why Rick didn't say China, Korea or wherever the guy is coming from, but "a country where cat eating is very prominent", because, naturally, AGS members from that country would be offended as they were suspected of being "cat eaters", which, of course, is utter bullshit. And, as Snarky already pointed out, there are no "cat eating countries".

Would someone suspect me for stealing a grilled sausage in some country because I come from Germany where grilled sausages are a rather popular fastfood? I hope not 

Aside from that, I hope your cat is well and will eventually return to you.

[Calin Leafshade]

Its always the Germans that steal the sausages... everyone knows that.

[Snarky]

Darth said he doesn't want to take part in the thread any more, but I think that apart from differing on the reasonableness of the theory Rick posted, the rest of the disagreement with him was mainly a matter of miscommunication.

[cat]

Would someone suspect me for stealing a grilled sausage in some country because I come from Germany where grilled sausages are a rather popular fastfood? I hope not 

Well, in the sausage case it is very unlikely that it ran away or got run down by a car.

Other than that, I hope the cat will return safely!

[Shane 'ProgZmax' Stevens]

I stole the german sausages.

I CONFESS!


P.S.- I'd reply to what Darth said but there's not much point when someone is so dead set on their own opinion they state their unwillingness to consider conflicting points and then abruptly depart the conversation.

Oh well, I still love him .