Cat member of the cat family, the felids, which are a rapidly evolving family of mammals that share a common ancestor only 10–15 million years ago and include lions, tigers, cougars and many others. Within this family, domestic cats ("Felis catus") are part of the genus "Felis", which is a group of small cats containing about seven species (depending upon classification scheme). Members of the genus are found worldwide and include the jungle cat ("Felis chaus") of southeast Asia, European wildcat ("F. silvestris silvestris"), African wildcat ("F. s. lybica"), the Chinese mountain cat ("F. bieti"), and the Arabian sand cat ("F.
Kick the cat anxiety or other emotions. Psychology author Raj Persaud suggests that people "kick the cat" as a means of catharsis because they fear expressing their full emotions to the peers and colleagues. Kick the cat Kick the cat (or kick the dog) is a metaphor used to describe how a relatively high-ranking person in an organization or family displaces his or her frustrations by abusing a lower-ranking person, who may in turn take it out on his or her own subordinate. The term has been used at least since the 19th century. According to author John Bradshaw, humans were far more