For a time in the 1970s, the people who lived on Iriomote Island said the government of Japan thought the cats were more important than they were. One German scientist had asked the government of Japan to make all the human beings leave the island to protect the cat. Other scientists showed, however, that the cat can live next to humans and is not afraid to look for food near farms and rice paddies. In 2019, many Iriomote islanders said they were proud of their rare wildcat, though they worried that too many tourists would come to their island and damage it.