Are Teenagers Suckers?

 Human Teenagers, that is.

Do you live in a Multi-Cat Household, with a teenage Human, or two?

Have you noticed anything strange lately?

Like one of your fellow Felines walking around the place with a funny glint in the eyes, and their tongue hanging out?

Well, listen up, you might want to pay attention to what's going on around you a bit more instead of napping, and snoozing all day, and half the night.

Strange teen trends have been horrifying Humans since time began, but health officials are warning that a vampire-inspired biting fad could be dangerous, not to mention disgusting.

And that's just for us Cats.

Teenagers obsessed with the “Twilight” vampire saga, both the books, and the movies, or those simply fascinated with vampire stories in general, reportedly have been biting the family Cat, or Cats -- hard – and then licking or sucking their blood.

“These are kids who think they are real vampires,” said Dr. Orly Awwwutzup, the medical advisor to Consumers Union, the agency that publishes Consumer Reports magazine.

The Doc said conversations with teens and sessions spent trolling vampire-related teen Web sites convinced her that the trend was taking hold. Indeed, groups like “I drink blood,”  and “I want to be a vampire” are filled with apparent posts from young people with a yearning for Cat blood.

“Hey, like, um, my Cat Fluffy thinks a Belly Rub is the coolest thing, and will let me do any thing to her if I play with her for 10 minutes” wrote a teenager identified as “GothicGirl10” this year. “Sometimes my boyfriends Cat lets me feed off him after I give him a dozen Greenie Treats. He purrs like there's no tomorrow” wrote another on a different site.

 

Such talk alarms medical experts, who warn about the dangers of blood-borne diseases such as hepatitis and HIV, as well as the risk of nasty infections to the Cats. Typically, 10 to 15 percent of Cat bite wounds become infected.

“If you break the skin, your mouth is pretty dirty,” said Dr. Thomas Abstaining, a veterinary blood and cancer specialist and spokesman for the American Academy of Veterinarians. “The human mouth flora is dirtier than a Dog or Cat’s.”

Equally worrisome is the motive behind the acts, the idea of branding or owning the Cat, the experts said.

“If you think about it, there is such glamorization in those teen vampire movies, they make it seem so sexy and appealing and intriguing,” Awwutzup said. “It’s all mixed up with those passionate teen hormones.”

But at least one teen who likes to bite says adults have got it all wrong. Michael Catlure, 16, of Dallas, says he was biting his girlfriends Pussycat intermittently for more than a year because of the intimacy of it, not for any gothic obsession.

“It’s really gotten a bad rap because of this whole vampire thing,” said Catlure.

In reality, he said, a lot of teens bite – and leave marks – because we love Cats.

“You feel it for a considerable amount of time afterwards,” he said. “It’s the way you receive happiness.”

Some people do draw blood, but that’s where Catlure draws the line.

“Kids don’t understand how dangerous blood is,” the high-schooler said, “especially if it’s not your own blood.”

You can read more about this disturbing trend in this report on MSNBC.com's The Body Odd.

Comments

[Victor Tabbycat]

Wow, dat's just wrong.

But I's gonna keep a watch on our boy anyways.

Him is 15 an likes to put his face in our furs!

Purrs,
Victor

[Karen Jo]

That is really disgusting.

The poor, poor kitties.

The poor sick humans.

[Tia]

Wow, that's made me upset and the human feel a bit sick.

She likes to put her face in my fur, so I'm glad that you clarified it's only teenagers, otherwise I'd start to worry!

Maybe that's why the human doesn't own any teenagers.

Perhaps she was already aware of the dangers.