In the dawning days of social media it was one of the first clips of its kind to go globally viral – and has since been viewed many millions of times.
A very ordinary woman is seen walking down a very ordinary street when she comes upon a cat. The cat, apparently friendly and seeking attention, jumps up from the pavement to a garden wall to get closer.
The woman strokes the cat a couple of times while glancing around then suddenly grabs it by the scruff of the neck and then, with surprising dexterity, flips open the lid of an adjacent wheelie bin, throws the cat inside, shuts the bin, and continues walking as if nothing has happened….Initially, she was unrepentant, saying she did ‘not deserve to be hated’ for her moment of madness and claimed people were overreacting.
‘I really don’t see what everyone is getting so excited about. It’s just a cat,’ she said. ‘I was walking home from work and saw this cat wander out in front of me. I was playing with it, stroking it and listening to it purr as it stood on a garden wall. It was very friendly.
‘I don’t know what came over me, but I suddenly thought it would be funny to put it in the wheelie bin, which was right beside me. I did it as a joke because I thought it would be funny. I never thought it would be trapped. I expected it to wriggle out of the bin.’
Bale added: ‘People are reading too much into things. I’ve no feelings about cats one way or the other. I don’t keep pets myself, but I have no problem with people who do.
‘To think this video is being seen around the world is unbelievable. I’m a very private person and don’t want to upset any members of my family. I don’t know what my relatives will think, but to be honest I think everyone’s overreacting a bit.
‘OK, I shouldn’t have done it, but it’s just a cat at the end of the day. I don’t think I deserve to be hated by people all over the world, it was just a split second of madness.’
American Buddhist Net 