Some background on this comic:

Transcript:

The flak over the “Tethercat” cartoon is of a sort I always find interesting. I could understand the problem if these were kids batting an animal around a pole, but that natural animosity between dogs and cats has always provided fodder for humor in various forms. In animated children’s cartoons, for example, dogs and cats are constantly getting smashed into oblivion by a variety of violent means. (I’d like to know if the creators of “Tom and Jerry” got these letters. Probably, so that doesn’t help me.)

What I think I’ve figured out is, in animation, a cat might be flattened by a steamroller or get blown up by dynamite, but a few seconds later we see him back in business―chasing something or being chased until he’s “killed” again. There’s never a suggestion that the cat’s suffering is anything but transitory. In a single-panel cartoon, however, no resolution is possible. The dogs play “tethercat” forever. You put the cartoon down, come back to it a few hours later, and, yep―those dogs are still playing “tethercat.” I suppose some people may have appreciated a disclaimer at the bottom of the cartoon saying, “Note: A few minutes later, the cat escaped, returned with a bazooka and blew the dogs away.” (Of course, now I’m on the dogs’ case.)