# What exactly is a furry?



## kitreshawn (Apr 6, 2010)

I know there is a whole lot of personal view in the way people approach the question but recently I have been considering it and am looking to see what everyone's current take on the subject is.

Oddly enough I have been writing quite a bit lately, but nothing I would consider furry.

I've been doing this kind of deconstruction of my stories and trying to pull out anything at all that didn't seem necessary, including character descriptions, just to see how it works out.  Since the characters become nothing but personality without any physical self you can't really qualify them as furry.  Basically I wanted to see what happened with the characters in my mind if they were just a personality and most of them actually became people.  In effect this tells me that their being anthro animals was completely unimportant to the story.

So basically I have been simply writing non-furry stuff, mostly shorter exercises from this nice book I have, while I try to determine what exactly would make the character being a fur vital to the story without seeming like it beats people over the head with any sort of message or the fact that they are an anthro.

Anyway, in the process of investigating this with as of yet not much luck I stumbled across the idea of what about Dragons?  I mean Tolken-esque type dragons that tend to be based on a European idea of the critters where they are intelligent, able to speak, and all of that.  Things that are the size of a house and not anthropomorphized beyond being intelligent and able to talk.  Is such a dragon a furry?

If not then what about a sentient dog that can speak?  Or if yes what if the dragon is sentient but cannot speak anything humans can understand (and no, no empathy or telepathy either)?  Still a furry?  As odd as the question seems what about a non-sentient animal that can speak?  Is it furry?

Mainly the question here is what are the minimum requirements for a character to be a 'furry.'


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## nybx4life (Apr 6, 2010)

kitreshawn said:


> Mainly the question here is what are the minimum requirements for a character to be a 'furry.'



To be furry is entirely dependent on who answers the question.
To me, it's pretty much an anthromorphic character; or at least a person with facial characteristics of some animal.


It's understandable that if your characters were human, it would change nothing. From what I've read, unless it's just something on the side, the writer *makes* it important.

there's a few ways to make it happen. Have your characters more animal-like, or have the characters being a specific "furry" symbolize their personality.

For example, a dog furry could be someone truly loyal, who sticks by someone no matter what. A wolf can go two ways: the lone wolf route, where they stay by themselves, and keep away from groups; or the wolf pack route, where it's a group of wolves.

Do you understand what I'm getting at?


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## Stratelier (Apr 6, 2010)

nybx4life said:


> For example, a dog furry could be someone truly loyal, who sticks by someone no matter what. A wolf can go two ways: the lone wolf route, where they stay by themselves, and keep away from groups; or the wolf pack route, where it's a group of wolves.


That's known as Animal Stereotyping, and should be treated with care should you choose to go that route.


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## Carenath (Apr 6, 2010)

As one intelligent person summarised it:
Furry is the phenomenon of creating non-human alter-egos. As distinct from 'furs' and 'furries', the subgroup who are generally described as fans of anthropomorphic animals.

What constitutes furry characters i.e. created characters that are considered furs/furries by members of the Furry Fandom is in the eyes of the beholder and many varying definitions will surface depending on who you ask.
This has lead to different furs encapsulating others into the fandom where it's inappropriate to do so (i.e. they disagree with being typed as such).

The lines can be pretty clear-cut for the most part when the source/reference animal is one that exists and is known (dogs, wolves, cats, tigers etc), but, these same lines become very distorted when "mythical" creatures are used as the source/reference and have become points of contention. Dragons being a notable example.


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## panzergulo (Apr 7, 2010)

Pretty much what Carenath said.

"A furry" is a fan of anthropomorphic animals. Other than that, it's pretty much dependent on the viewer if something is "furry" or "a furry"... it's more like an umbrella term used by furries when they are describing "anthro animals", "cartoon animals" or "funny animals"... but I doubt anybody outside the fandom would use the term to describe anything else than members of the "sub-culture" (meta-culture?) called "furry".

I know from experience that calling anything else than the fans and maybe their online characters as "furries" can cause problems... so, for example, "furry fiction" is one damn difficult term. You will have furries or people involved with the furry fandom going "lalalalalaIcanthearyou" and shoving their own opinions and definitions on your face, if you try to ask, for example, if a short story or a novel might be "furry", that is, "furry fiction", "furry short story" or "furry novel".

"Furry" is an adjective to describe something that is covered with fur. ;Ã¾


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## kitreshawn (Apr 7, 2010)

I think the difficulty here is what exactly is Anthropomorphism compared to what makes a furry character.  The waters get even muddier when people create even more animalistic characters, especially quads, which they then call non-anthros even though they are anthropomorphised as they can talk, reason, and so forth as people.

The main conclusion that I have been approaching in a very round about way is that most furry writing doesn't contain Anthromorphized animals at all.

Let me explain what I mean.  As I mentioned up above deconstructing my characters to the greatest extend possible so that only what was necessary to the story was left behind I ended up discovering that them being anthro or not didn't really matter to the story itself.

And this is hardly unique to my writing, I see it very often  and would be hard pressed to name a furry story I've read where the characters being anthro animals impacted the story very significantly.  I certainly cannot think of any right off the top of my head while writing this.

For example, take nybx4life comment (not picking on him, it is just instructive and a part of the thread).  Lets say you take his advice and use the animals to symbolize character traits or culture.  It is hardly a bad idea, and probably does give readers something to latch onto a bit regarding those traits.  But when you really get down to it does their being a dog make them any more loyal of a character than you could have written as a human?  Could you envision a human culture that is just as 'tribal' as what wolves might have?

The answer I come up with is ultimately yes, which means that the animal traits of the character don't really impact the story; they are unnecessary beyond the audience (admittedly an important consideration, but there it is).  One thing I have always thought was true is that unimportant aspects must ALWAYS be cut from a story because they ultimately dilute it and can make something that is good merely okay in short order because of how they get in the way.

More to the point it quickly becomes apparent that these are not Anthropomorphised characters, but rather Zoomorphised humans (effectively imagining humans as animals, ah la Maus and Animal Farm).  It is an effective tool which can help remove humanity from a story in order to make the tale more acceptable to the target audience, however that is not the goal of most furry writing.  Most furry authors are attempting to inject a humanity into their characters, not edit it out.

Which brings us back to the initial question:  What makes a character furry?  What makes their animal traits matter to the story and causes them to be a more effective character than a human could provide?


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## Poetigress (Apr 7, 2010)

kitreshawn said:


> The waters get even muddier when people create even more animalistic characters, especially quads, which they then call non-anthros even though they are anthropomorphised as they can talk, reason, and so forth as people.



In the case of quads, I think we're getting into another area where it depends on what people are using the words to mean.

Technically, I consider "anthropomorphic" to mean any animals given human traits, and to me the traits involved are some form of speech (verbal or otherwise), a human level of intelligence and consciousness, and ideally some form of culture. So that, to me, includes things like Watership Down, where you have essentially "real" rabbits, and it also includes characters like S. Andrew Swann's moreaus, who are bipedal and wear clothing and so on.

The semantic issue here is that when some people say "anthro" (or say it in certain contexts), they mean the bipedal, human-like sort of character only, not just talking wolves. So that's why you get people saying that quads are "non-anthro" even though, by the first definition, they are anthropomorphic.

As someone with a quad fursona, this gets exceptionally confusing. :/ I've had to refer to the character as zoomorphic, a quad, a feral, whatever, to make sure people understand. (The "feral" term is particularly interesting, since the true definition has nothing to do with a quad stance; in that case, I think people are taking off on the idea of wildness or something.)

To me the question of whether we have animals given human traits or humans given animal traits is kind of splitting hairs to no practical purpose. It might be helpful to consider on the level of a single story, to figure out where the character falls on the spectrum, but it's always going to be a blend to some extent.

These days I also make the distinction that, having the anthro nature of the characters be important to the _story_ does not necessarily mean it's crucial to the _plot._ Sometimes what you gain from using anthro characters is a certain stylistic effect, a sense of distance, or the like, not necessarily that the events of the story hinge on it. In some cases, you could make the characters human and still play out the same basic plot, but it's not going to be the same story. There's a lot of gray area, and while I get irritated by what I call "fox goes to Starbucks" stories, where it's entirely our normal world and life except with fur, it's not truly easy to come up with a cut-and-dried set of criteria for crucial here vs. unnecessary here. That said, I do still think it's valuable for writers to at least give some thought as to why they're using anthro characters and what they would lose (or not) by using humans instead--even if what they would lose might be slippery to define.


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## Atrak (Apr 7, 2010)

The answer to this question is subjective, and not based on fact.

Therefore, you will not reach a logical conclusion.

Only an opinion.


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## Carenath (Apr 7, 2010)

kitreshawn said:


> I think the difficulty here is what exactly is Anthropomorphism compared to what makes a furry character.  The waters get even muddier when people create even more animalistic characters, especially quads, which they then call non-anthros even though they are anthropomorphised as they can talk, reason, and so forth as people
> dilute it and can make something that is good merely okay in short order because of how they get in the way.





Poetigress said:


> Technically, I consider "anthropomorphic" to mean any animals given human traits, and to me the traits involved are some form of speech (verbal or otherwise), a human level of intelligence and consciousness, and ideally some form of culture. So that, to me, includes things like Watership Down, where you have essentially "real" rabbits, and it also includes characters like S. Andrew Swann's moreaus, who are bipedal and wear clothing and so on.
> 
> The semantic issue here is that when some people say "anthro" (or say it in certain contexts), they mean the bipedal, human-like sort of character only, not just talking wolves. So that's why you get people saying that quads are "non-anthro" even though, by the first definition, they are anthropomorphic.


These three points are just what I was referring to when I stated the contention between different viewpoints on what constitutes "furry" and the encapsulation of non-furry related componants into the Furry Fandom.


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## Alexis (Apr 7, 2010)

I read the posts from the start, I think you're all over thinking this.  Which is pretty rare coming from me (If ya knew me).

It all boils down to this, a furry is anthropomorphism of any animal.  Being a furry yourself is considering it an alternate or even your own persona (Your 'fursona').
  Furry characters can be the most basic attempt to understand animal thoughts and write them down, the very act anthropomophises what you attempt to create.
 Or you could go to the other end of the scale and simply have a human with the animal traits emphasized to create a furry story.

I don't think you need to set boundaries on having humans and furries interact as well, I reckon anything with any furry in is valid furry material for the community since the creator will probably be trying to articulate an intruiging point through this alter-ego.


Man... now _I_ think my own thoughts are pish... wtf


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## BatRat (Apr 8, 2010)

Would this be furry?
Alot of the characters in my fantasy stories are "normal" races (Orcs, Elves, etc.) but have _animal_ characteristics and tend to dress as animals.  You could say they are furries themselves.  Would this be considered furry as well?


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## Stratelier (Apr 8, 2010)

Tolkeinese races have been ingrained into the fantasy mindset before the institutionalization of the Furry fandom.  So no, they are generally not considered "furry".

But, I must say I've never heard orc attire phrased in terms of "fursuiting" before.


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## Xipoid (Apr 8, 2010)

To qualify as furry to me, it has to involve anthropomorphic animal characters in a sort of derpy/cheesy way. If they are extremely well written and the are given a well formed reason for existence I no longer consider it furry and instead a form of anthro art.


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## ScottyDM (Apr 8, 2010)

The first thing that popped into my head when I saw the title of this thread was...

*Moldy Fruit.*

I suspect that wasn't the answer you were looking for. ;-)

S~


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## ScottyDM (Apr 8, 2010)

Back...

How about a better answer than "moldy fruit."


Back in 2006/2007 or so, several of us over at Anthro Archives . Org debated the nature of anthrofiction. What was it? What should it be? Can it be defined?

Well, it's fiction. And, it should have one or more anthropomorphic characters. But what else?

_Lord of the Rings_ had gobs of anthropomorphic characters, because technically speaking, hobbits and dwarves and whatnot aren't human. However, they've been given human characteristics and are therefore anthropomorphic. But _LotR_ is clearly fantasy, not anthrofiction. So my early definition had a list of character types that were not anthrofiction character types.

The problem with any list is it's both too much and not enough. Is a story that contains a werewolf anthrofiction or horror? The answer lies in the nature of the story, not the character's species.

I started gravitating toward a definition that relied on the focus of the story. Was it about the character and their nonhuman-humanity? Or was it focused on something else, such as disemboweling teenage girls by the light of the full moon?

That definition was better than a list, but it had a certain hoity-toity factor: "I write anthrofiction, therefore my story is better than your story." :roll: 

*I finally realized that the definition of the genre had to do with the nature of the elements in the story.*

Now there are several ways to think about genre, the two main ways are marketing-wise, and academic-wise. I'm going to focus on the academics, which is useful to authors, editors, true fans, teachers, or anyone who wishes to discuss and understand a particular story.

Academic-wise, and structurally speaking, *all of fiction can be split into two huge super-genres: speculative and realistic.* Also note there are other ways to divide fiction such as it's purpose, or the emotional impact on the reader. *Speculative fiction contains one or more speculative elements: things which cannot exist in the world as we know it.* Which means you can have "realistic" fiction which is poorly written and therefore contains unrealistic character reactions and such, but that doesn't make it speculative.

So, the super-genre of speculative fiction contains: sci-fi, fantasy, some types of horror, supernatural, alternate history, anthrofiction, and others. *How you decide is based on the nature of the speculative element.* Science or technology = sci-fi, magic or magical creatures = fantasy, ghosts and supernatural beings = supernatural or horror (depending on the emotional reaction the author is shooting for), and *anthropomorphic characters = anthrofiction*. Obviously one can combine genres under this classification system.

*Thus, anthrofiction and furry fiction are the same thing.* Well... except for the fact that one may anthropomorphize wildflowers in anthrofiction but not in furry. But that's a very minor point.

Now marketing-wise is a whole other thing. If it's speculative, and it's not something else (such as horror or kid-lit), then it _is_ fantasy/sci-fi. That's a very imprecise definition. But it satisfies the sales guys who work for the publishers, the buyers who work for the bookstores, the clerks who shelve the books, and the readers who wander around the store looking for something that's similar to something else they read only last week and liked.

S~

PS: My short definition of anthrofiction/furry fiction is: "Talking animal stories for grown-ups." But that's as imprecise as the marketing definition for fantasy/sci-fi. So I suppose it's good. ;-)


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## Poetigress (Apr 8, 2010)

ScottyDM said:


> My short definition of anthrofiction/furry fiction is: "Talking animal stories for grown-ups." But that's as imprecise as the marketing definition for fantasy/sci-fi. So I suppose it's good. ;-)



Honestly, as imprecise as it may be, that short definition sounds better and better to me all the time. And I can certainly see it working for people who aren't familiar with the fandom, which is another plus.


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## ScottyDM (Apr 8, 2010)

Stratadrake said:


> nybx4life said:
> 
> 
> > For example, a dog furry could be someone truly loyal, who sticks by someone no matter what. A wolf can go two ways: the lone wolf route, where they stay by themselves, and keep away from groups; or the wolf pack route, where it's a group of wolves.
> ...


Interesting website, but *just because it's a trope does not mean it's a bad idea or should be avoided.*

The opposite is to *anti-animal stereotype*. Such as a skunk, particularly the common two-striped skunk _Mephitis mephitis_, who is energetic, athletic, or shows gymnastic aptitude. Real skunks, at least once they reach adulthood, are sedate, football shaped, waddle (short legs), and couldn't climb if their life depended on it.

Usually the anti-animal stereotype is done because the author likes a particular animal, and is unwilling to take the time to learn anything about their chosen animal. A terrible mismatch, such as a ninja skunk who scales an elevator shaft to get to her target, throws me out of the story enough that I immediately move on to something else.

*The type of animal stereotype that should be avoided is the sort of thing Brian Jacques does in his Redwall Abby series:* _All_ rabbits are good, _all_ foxes are evil, etc. There is a certain logic to that, as his stories are mostly told from the viewpoint of small herbivores, and to them anything that eats small herbivores is evil. Oddly, his Eurasian badgers are good, even though a badger would eat a rabbit if it could catch one. Likewise with river otters. While river otters are carnivores, they usually limit their diets to fish, which aren't "people" in Jacques' storyworld (the giant pike was a monster). But why would a river otter fraternize with rabbits and squirrels, but not foxes and weasels? His logic breaks down. Except that *it seems to be based on the logic of the English gentleman farmer:* Rabbits good because you can shoot them. Foxes bad because they kill chickens. *But as an anthropomorphic storyworld, Jacques logic is cracked.*

S~


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## ScottyDM (Apr 8, 2010)

Poetigress said:


> Honestly, as imprecise as it may be, that short definition sounds better and better to me all the time. And I can certainly see it working for people who aren't familiar with the fandom, which is another plus.


And it takes a whole lot fewer words. The long explanation is justification why anthro/furry is distinct from fantasy/sci-fi. It's about the characters, not things or powers. Also, my choice of "grown-ups" rather than "adults" is deliberate.

If anthrofiction and furry fiction are the same thing (mostly) then when talking to someone inside the fandom you can say, "I write furry fiction." But when talking to someone outside the fandom you can say, "I write anthrofiction." 

S~


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## skunkspray03 (Apr 8, 2010)

kitreshawn said:


> Anyway, in the process of investigating this with as of yet not much luck I stumbled across the idea of what about Dragons?  I mean Tolken-esque type dragons that tend to be based on a European idea of the critters where they are intelligent, able to speak, and all of that.  Things that are the size of a house and not anthropomorphized beyond being intelligent and able to talk.  Is such a dragon a furry?
> 
> If not then what about a sentient dog that can speak?  Or if yes what if the dragon is sentient but cannot speak anything humans can understand (and no, no empathy or telepathy either)?  Still a furry?  As odd as the question seems what about a non-sentient animal that can speak?  Is it furry?
> 
> Mainly the question here is what are the minimum requirements for a character to be a 'furry.'



really, furry characters shouldn't act much different than human characters, other than using their traits, like fangs, claws, and the like.

as for the dragons, I'd say that they are a bit to feral to be considered a furry


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## Stratelier (Apr 9, 2010)

ScottyDM said:


> Interesting website, but just because it's a trope does not mean it's a bad idea or should be avoided.


Don't worry, the Tropes wiki has sucked enough free weekends out of my life that I know exactly what it is, and is not, about.


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## Carenath (Apr 9, 2010)

There's only thing, ScottyDM that I would have to disagree with you on.
You say that LOTR had gobs of Anthropomorphic characters and then cite Dwarfs and Elves as examples.
That would be fine, except, they have always posessed those traits (speech, sapience etc) to start with. The Ents on the other hand, you could get away with claiming them as anthropomorphic trees because trees don't naturally posess those traits.
The same applies to dragons IMO giving you an obvious difference between anthropomorphic and non-anthropomorphic variations of the creature.


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## M. LeRenard (Apr 9, 2010)

Let's all keep in mind that the word 'anthropomorphize' means, simply, to attribute human traits to non-humans.  So when you walk outside and see a big storm on the horizon and you tell your friend, "The weather's looking pretty glum," well, glum is an emotion, so you're anthropomorphizing the weather.
And then it's also amusing to call anything but a human 'anthro', because 'anthro' is a Greek root (from the Greek word _anthropos_) that means 'man'.
So when you ask if a dragon that is intelligent and can speak is anthropomorphized, well, since we consider intelligence of that caliber and ability to speak to be singularly human characteristics, the short answer is yes.
But we get into some really complicated territory, here, because what we consider 'human' characteristics are based on cultural definitions of such things.  It used to be that we thought empathy was something only humans had, but then we discovered the bonobo.  Same goes for tool-making and tool-using, which we now recognize chimpanzees and certain kinds of crows are capable of (among others).  So the definition itself is really fuzzy, because it's always changing with new discoveries.  Suppose we find out that Neanderthals made art: suddenly art is no longer just a human trait either.  Or music, or whatever.  You see where this is going.
So far as fantasy races like dwarves and elves and hobbits are concerned, that's walking into SETI Institute territory, really.  The question of non-human intelligence, and what it is and what it isn't and what it might be.  That kind of thing is purely speculative at this point, so asking if Tolkien's dwarves are anthropomorphized animals is like asking if the traditional alien gray is an anthropomorphized animal.  Or is it an alien, which is something different?  Does it matter if it comes from another world, like Middle Earth?
Blah blah blah.  You could ask questions like those forever and never come up with a good answer.
So I guess what I'm saying is, trying to figure out what makes something 'furry' or 'anthro' is a worthless exercise.  We don't even know what makes us 'human', when it comes right down to it.  You're asking the question that people have been asking themselves for millenia, when you think about it that way.  And I assume this thread wasn't meant to be quite this deeply philosophical, right?

So I like Scotty's definition.


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## Stratelier (Apr 10, 2010)

There is also the obscure term _anthropopathy_, referring exclusively to the attribution of human _pathos_ (emotions) to the otherwise non.  But you hardly ever hear that term in common use.


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## Stargazer Bleu (Apr 10, 2010)

Theres really nothing that is actualy furry. 
Anthropomorphic characters are among the most common. This can have different levels of what one likes about it. Same for other areas of intrest.
Its basicaly just a fandom  in which many share one or more common intrest. Some of these are more common than others.


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## Alexis (Apr 11, 2010)

I think you have to take the proper definition of _anthropomorphism_ like MLR and Scott agree on and add Stratadrakes input of _anthropopathy_.  This is really what it is to be a furry and what furry content is about.

If you eliminate all Tolkienesque staples of fantasy fiction you have the core of what 'furry'ism is about, around that are various layers that don't fit quite inside the box but are nonetheless still part of the same community.

But one thing, isn't part of being a furry recognizing animalistic traits in yourself?  And don't furries also tend to be more interested in the natural environment, specifically  preserving and restoring it as well as worshiping life?  So in other terms, part of being a furry is being slightly peganistic as well...


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## panzergulo (Apr 11, 2010)

Alexis said:


> But one thing, isn't part of being a furry recognizing animalistic traits in yourself?  And don't furries also tend to be more interested in the natural environment, specifically  preserving and restoring it as well as worshiping life?  So in other terms, part of being a furry is being slightly peganistic as well...



The what now? I thought furries were just a bunch of fantasy/scifi nerds who like cartoon animals?

Just saying... it might be safer to keep believes and religion out from this... has caused drama before too. I'm not a religious person. I'm not a nature activist. I don't... worship... anything. And many furries are like me. Secular. Just saying.

Besides, we were talking about what kind of a character makes a furry character. I can't quite see how the writer's spiritual condition has anything to do with it... sure, maybe his or her approach to the subjects might be a bit different, but that doesn't change the fact that the character is furry only because it's like a human in fursuit. Worshiping animals doesn't mean a person can write believable anthro characters.

I had the same problem before... trying to find out what is "furry fiction", "furry character" or "furry art" makes people confused... and instead, they start talking about what makes "a furry"... and possibly confusing spiritual things with it all.


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## M. LeRenard (Apr 11, 2010)

A striking number of furries are atheists, actually, so no, spirituality has nothing to do with it.  Not anything to do with the hobby, anyhow.  If you want to combine the two, go right ahead, but it's most certainly not the default position.


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## kitreshawn (Apr 12, 2010)

Heh, this actually gathered more well thought posts than I expected.  Thanks all, feel free to let the thread die now.


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