If you found a dead cat at the bottom of your garden, what would you do with it? This question has been on my mind ever since I met a vicar who told me that he knew a broadcaster of a Christian persuasion with whom I was acquainted. When I mentioned this man of the cloth to the presenter in question, he said, “Oh yes, he’s a bit of a dead cat vicar.” My quizzical look prompted him to expand: “As in a bit hopeless, so gets moved from parish to parish, like if you find a dead cat in your garden – you just throw it over the fence and make it your neighbour’s problem.”
I was amazed by the sheer economy of this notion’s unpleasantness, with so few words used to convey disrespect for the deceased cat, the neighbour and the poor vicar himself, who had seemed rather nice to me. Perhaps concision in all things is a Christian virtue.
But what is it about cats? All God’s creatures have a right to die but cats are forced to stretch out the misery more than any other species. Not only do they get nine lives, but then the poor things are given unpleasant afterlives. The example above is possibly the least well known; I’ve only heard it used on this one occasion. But there are several other cat carcasses in common parlance. Only last week I heard the brouhaha about honours and the disciplining of Boris Johnson described as useful dead cats to have on the table to distract us from the horrors of rising mortgage rates.
And there’s an even worse indignity for a dead cat than to be slapped on a table. When I started out presenting business programmes there was plenty I found mystifying, but nothing more so than the market watcher who told me an uptick in a company’s hitherto plummeting share price was nothing but “a dead cat bounce” – as in: even a dead cat will bounce if dropped from a great enough height. Horrible.
Let’s leave the moggies alone. And, for the record, if I did find an ex-cat in my garden and I couldn’t identify its owners, I would certainly honour it with a civilised send-off, a decent burial.
Adrian Chiles is a broadcaster, writer and Guardian columnist
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