The old trope about lesbians and cats has not completely disappeared, but when we read up on why it exists, we knew we were on very shaky ground. It allegedly got rather controversial during early lesbian feminism in the 1970s when communities embraced cats as symbols of independent, unapologetic living.  Like cats, queer women were often expected to seek male approval, and both groups famously refuse to do so. Hmmm.

Then, of course, gay men have muscled in.  Literally. The intersection of gay men and cats involves a mix of cultural stereotypes, modern social realities, and psychological research into pet ownership.  For a long time, traditional gender roles stereotyped dogs as “masculine” and cats as “feminine.” Consequently, a cultural myth emerged that associated men who own cats with being gay, or viewed cat ownership as a sign of reduced masculinity.  In doing this wee research, what shocked us most was that we discovered users across online discussions on platforms like Quora and Facebook Groups generally agree that the idea that a man’s pet dictates his sexual orientation is a false and outdated stereotype. Statistically, the vast majority of cat owners worldwide are heterosexual, simply because they make up the majority of the population. 

However, it’s hard to believe that they could be the reason why cats have found their way onto our screens, big and small.  They become stars as pets, villains, and accomplices; travel on spaceships; wear human clothes; inherit large sums of money; and drink spilled blood to morph into cat-woman hybrids. They can inhabit so many roles; the only limit to their movie credits is a director’s imagination.  

The Encyclopedia of Movie Cats features over 1,000 cats and has been a really big hit in the Queerguru office by everyone except one.  Grayson, our striking grey Korat, knows he’s a star and acts like one every waking moment of his day.  Now he’s puzzled about why he’s never made it in the movies.  He scoffs at all the famous felines that are in the book, such as Holly Golightly’s orange tabby and Jones from the Alien movies, encounters Bastet’s messengers and witch familiars, and meets the real-life cat actors with IMDb pages of their own.