Well, cats *do* have a quite strict hierarchy which is far from ad-hoc establishment of the pecking order. So the analogy dosn't hold with cat behavioral experts. However, if cats could perform anonymized hissing, biting and scratching, then I'm sure that cypherpunk maillist would be a good analogy for cat behavior.
Second, if you examine the context of the original post, the statement was a metaphor about leaderless ("anarchic") assemblies such as this list. In particular, the Feds (dogs) haven't historically understood that this list is the equivalent of a grad lounge or spontaneous beach party: there are multiple conversations, no one is moderating or otherwise choreographing squat. When cats encounter each other by chance, they may assert dominance, (linguistic pissing contests are not unheard of here :-) but their lives are not structured around following, or smelling the higher-up's ass.
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