Cat Lady Chats: The Stereotype

**post updated 10/6/23**No discussion of cat ladies would be complete without discussing how the crazy got into the cat lady stereotype in the first place, and, how hard it is to remove it today. Even for cat ladies themselves! Today I’m talking to Lucy Meggeson, host of The Spinsterhood Reimagined Podcast, and Haley Shapley, Author of Strong Like Her, to continue our conversation about cat ladies.

Haley shared some fascinating facts about how images of cats were used to discredit women fighting for the right to vote. In the eyes of the anti-sufferage movement, cats were useless, silly, feminine beings who belonged in the home, who needed the safety of the domestic sphere, and who didn’t deserve to be seen and heard. Just like human women. Here are some of the memes:

This last image actually tells the fascinating story of how government tried to silence suffragists and the cruel game of cat and mouse they played with suffragettes (the name for suffragists in the UK.)

Read more about the history of anti-sufferage memes:

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/the-bizarre-history-of-anti-suffrage-cat-memes_n_5818f36ce4b00f11fc5c38b5

https://thesocietypages.org/socimages/2013/12/04/the-feminization-of-the-cat-in-anti-suffrage-propaganda/

https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/teaching-justice-anti-suffrage-postcards.htm

https://aphrabookclub.com/post/crazy-cat-lady-the-history-of-cat-memes-rooted-in-feminist-history/

Here’s Lucy Meggeson:

Instagram

Podcast

Lucy’s Last Appearance on The Spinster Life Podcast

Here’s Haley Shapley:

Instagram

Strong Like Her

Haley’s Last Appearance on The Spinster Life Podcast

More Spinster Life:InstagramYouTubeSubstack

Get full access to Hotter & Weirder at hotterandweirder.substack.com/subscribe