Today the Commentary section of the Los Angeles Times (page M5) featured a cartoon by Michael Ramirez, inspired by the recent announcement that researchers have cloned a cat.
The drawing shows a man in a lab coat with a picture of a cat and he is saying "Some people may consider pet cloning frivolous, but how else could I replace my little fluffy wuffy kitty-pooh? Around the edges of the drawing there are dozens of, presumably, homeless and unwanted cats.
I WISH that the people who cloned the cat did so to replace a beloved pet. But that has nothing to do with it. Instead of taking back the special pillow and toys of a genetic alter-ego, these cats were "designed" to be tortured to death, en masse to try to find a treatment for AIDS.
That's right, they were made to be killed. Because they will all be essentially, the same cat, researchers will be able to infect them with AIDS (the feline version) and then perform medical experiments on them. The nature of these "experiments" can only be imagined but after seeing what the medical research community has done to dogs and monkeys, the gristly truth will probably be far worse than any lay-person can imagine.
So, Mr. Ramirez, go ahead and dream of a world where biologists loved kittens so much that they would spend years and fortunes trying to get back one beloved "kitty-pooh" even though there are countless "unwanted" cats to be had. At least your version only features careless and unthinking cruelty. The reality is far more heart-wrenching.