by A famous little rat once said, “This is me. I think it’s apparent that I need to rethink my life a little bit.”
The rat was the beloved Remy from Disney’s “Ratatouille”, a film about a rodent foodie whose dream was to become a chef alongside humans in the human world. Remy also dreamed of serving up better fare for the city of Paris – another metropolis known for its inordinate rat population. A noble pursuit to be sure. More on that in a bit.
A recent Youtube video, showing a rat with a similar can-do attitude attempting to scurry away with a slice of pizza just may have eclipsed the Disney character. New York City’s Pizza Rat has become an overnight sensation, sparking a viral outpouring of support for the creature and inspiring all sorts of comparisons with the rat’s efforts – the need to survive, persevere and just get through the trials and tribulations of an ordinary day.
This week, Pizza Rat lucked out with an entire slice of pizza. But the typical “ordinary day” for a New York City rat is far less victorious and far more gruesome. More often than not, a New York rat scurries away with bits of bait from a bait station. That bait is usually laced with super-toxic anticoagulant rat poison. A substance that basically makes the rat bleed to death from the inside. Where that dead rat ends up in its final moments is anyone’s guess. Usually they succumb in some hidden away space becoming a rat carcass packed with still-super-toxic poison. Now, our city is littered with them.
This is us. This is New York City, our beloved center of the world where we attain otherworldly accomplishments and set unbelievable trends. Even our rats are famous. Yet – like Little Remy, the ambitious rodent who strived for a dish fitting his Parisian tastes, so too should we. There is a better, more humane and more ecological method of controlling vermin. As New Yorkers we can do better because we are better and in the 21st century, better rodent control means not littering or city with super-toxic poison.