I have to admit, all I could think of was "diabetes" when I saw those cats.
All the cats posted on the diabetes site look like this (except Pearl. She
is not overweight anymore and she was only about 4 lbs up before everything
started. Holding steady now though!)

I felt very sorry for all the cats on that site.  However, some cats are
big and muscular and weigh a lot.  Some cats can look a lot fatter than
they are in some positions.  Vino is between 10 and 12 lbs and sometimes
he looks skinny, sometimes he looks quite plump.  But really, I think
he's fine.  I guess what I'm saying is, I could take a picture of him in
a "fat moment" and submit it to the site and everyone seeing it might
think I was grossly overfeeding my cat.
But for those who are actually overfeeding their cats and they are
really obese, please think about your pet's health and future.  It is
only going to shorten your time together.

[[Gabey8 wrote:

I shall probably make myself unpopular with this comment, but I don't
care

actually.
I cannot understand why it is okay, and seemingly amusing for your
s-i-law

to post a picture of her grossly obese cat and expect congratulations.
Unless she is happy that she is killing him.  I looked at his pic and was

very sad to see how huge he was, no let's call it FAR TOO FAT and how at
risk from heart disease, diabetes and such.
Poor, poor cat.

Tweed]]

It might be easier to understand if I add a bit of history.

Saturn started out some years ago as The Cat, a big friendly tabby stray
that started hanging around my sister-in-law's house. She and my
brother-in-law told the four kids (now all adults), "Don't feed the stray,
he'll only keep coming around."

Several other families in the neighborhood were also leaving food out for
him.

We've joked about the way The Rules change while a family is in the
process of trying not to take in the stray that is working his way into
the mix. Well, this time it happened in real life.

"OK, you can feed him, but only outside".
"OK, we can put the cat food in the garage, but not in the house."
"OK, he can come in the house, but just the basement".
"OK, he can come in the whole house, but not on the furniture".

Somewhere in the course of all this, but before I met my husband, The Cat
showed up with a nasty abcess on his head. My s-i-l and her family felt
bad for The Cat, and took him to a vet. Where, it turns out, the vet
discovered that The Cat must have belonged to SOMEone at some point in
time because he was already neutered.

Anyway, once The Cat incurred vet bills, they decided that he was, in
fact, not just The Cat anymore; he was officially THEIR Cat. My nephew
dubbed him "Saturn", in deference to his size. It's not just girth, BTW --
he's a really BIG kitty, nose-to-tail and in all other dimensions. His
head and paws are HUGE, he has a deep, booming purr, and when he decided
to sandpaper my thumb a while back, I realized he has the biggest kitty
tongue I've ever seen.

Anyway, my cat-in-law is still an indoor-outdoor cat. And my sister-in-law
believes that other houses in the neighborhood STILL leave bowls of food
out for him. I can imagine why. He's a big friendly attention sponge with
a loud, frequently-used purr motor.

Short of turning him into an indoor-only cat, which is unlikely at this
stage of the game, I don't think there's any way for my sister-in-law to
have complete control over what the cat eats. No matter how sensibly she
feeds him, he's still getting gosh-knows-how-many servings of
who-knows-what-kind of food from neighboring homes. And as a formerly
stray cat, he's probably cleaning his plate every chance he gets.

But kudos to my s-i-l and her family for taking him in and giving him vet
care, a home complete with a fireplace to lounge in front of, and
attention. It's a far cry from his "don't feed that stray, he'll only keep
coming back" days.

Donna