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What Even Are Furries Anyway?
10 years ago
•runzu's net is still out and her situation isn’t getting any better. I worry about her deeply and her stress is only increasing, but she may be back online sooner than we thought. Also the lack of capitalization in front of her name is a continued source of distress.
•My financial and employment situation is still a cause for concern. I will still be able to eat but beyond that I am skint.
•The weather here in Britain is abnormally pleasant; sunshine for days and the only breeze is pleasant and inviting. Makes me wonder if God is plotting something.
•Still have lots to write and stuff to upload, but I have been busy the past few days trying to find a job.
It hasn’t been very long since I came out as a furry, since I admitted it to myself and since I embraced all what it is to be a furry. Still my family at large doesn’t actually know about it, and the reason why isn’t because of any shame I feel but simply because I cannot really elaborate what a furry is. I wanted to have a conversation about what it means to be a furry or a member of the furry community. The conversation is rather pedantic. You have been warned.
To start off with, let me first address the common definition of furry without the contextual noun, which is: “someone with an interest in anthropomorphic animals with human characteristics.” For most people thats all you need, and to most people I would send you merrily on your way, but for those who take issue with the definition or are interested in the debate lets blow holes through it, shall we?
Firstly let me just say that anthropomorphic means to have human traits so that bit about having “human characteristics” is entirely redundant. Its like describing a ball as “a sphere that is round and circle-shaped,” redundant to the point of silliness.
So now we are left with “someone with an interest in fictional anthropomorphic animals,” which is where we generate a source of contention. Are they animals with human traits, making anyone that likes furry characters sexually (a topic for another time) a zoophile, or are they the reverse, humans with animal traits. To many the latter is much easier to stomach, but to most there isn’t even a debate. Humans with animal traits, animals with human traits, it all manifests in the same visual equivalent, why should it matter?
Well I say it matters not only because several groups try to define themselves away from us, for understandable reasons, but because it doesn’t manifest in the same visual equivalent. Bronies and sonic fans, for example, both largely meet the literal definition for furry and even share typical traits and values with what I would call a differentiated furry, and many do conflate the fandoms altogether. To make matters even more confusing many furries are also bronies and sonic fans and yet many more take offence to the very idea that we might all be one in the same. So non-furries don’t want to be furries, furries don't want non-furries burdened with what we are and yet if we keep the definition as it stands we don’t really have a basis to argue otherwise.
Beyond semantics around the literal definition many people, myself included, feel that the definition is too light if simply unfitting for what we feel (as vague as that is) the community is. I for one believe the furry community goes deeper than simply an affiliation to a collection of similarly designed characters.
In my own mind we furries are a community that likes characters with animal traits that go as far as actually being animals in all ways aside from mind, ranging from a passing interest to a sexual fetish, and to the extent where most have our own fictionalized character that represents us. That is one hefty sentence, cobbled together from a myriad of ideas and even then if I look back on it I feel it is a grossly inaccurate statement. We are so much more than that, there is so much about us that is left undescribed and to anyone that encountered the community.
I don’t want to make this post any longer than it has to be, and so I shall call an end to it here, but if you have your own thoughts do please share them. I will go into other aspects of the community over the coming weeks, regardless of interest really. I want to get back into writing but I no longer feel in good consciousness that I can write the shitty smut I used to. Either way, this helps me write and allows me to escape my situation for a while.
•My financial and employment situation is still a cause for concern. I will still be able to eat but beyond that I am skint.
•The weather here in Britain is abnormally pleasant; sunshine for days and the only breeze is pleasant and inviting. Makes me wonder if God is plotting something.
•Still have lots to write and stuff to upload, but I have been busy the past few days trying to find a job.
It hasn’t been very long since I came out as a furry, since I admitted it to myself and since I embraced all what it is to be a furry. Still my family at large doesn’t actually know about it, and the reason why isn’t because of any shame I feel but simply because I cannot really elaborate what a furry is. I wanted to have a conversation about what it means to be a furry or a member of the furry community. The conversation is rather pedantic. You have been warned.
To start off with, let me first address the common definition of furry without the contextual noun, which is: “someone with an interest in anthropomorphic animals with human characteristics.” For most people thats all you need, and to most people I would send you merrily on your way, but for those who take issue with the definition or are interested in the debate lets blow holes through it, shall we?
Firstly let me just say that anthropomorphic means to have human traits so that bit about having “human characteristics” is entirely redundant. Its like describing a ball as “a sphere that is round and circle-shaped,” redundant to the point of silliness.
So now we are left with “someone with an interest in fictional anthropomorphic animals,” which is where we generate a source of contention. Are they animals with human traits, making anyone that likes furry characters sexually (a topic for another time) a zoophile, or are they the reverse, humans with animal traits. To many the latter is much easier to stomach, but to most there isn’t even a debate. Humans with animal traits, animals with human traits, it all manifests in the same visual equivalent, why should it matter?
Well I say it matters not only because several groups try to define themselves away from us, for understandable reasons, but because it doesn’t manifest in the same visual equivalent. Bronies and sonic fans, for example, both largely meet the literal definition for furry and even share typical traits and values with what I would call a differentiated furry, and many do conflate the fandoms altogether. To make matters even more confusing many furries are also bronies and sonic fans and yet many more take offence to the very idea that we might all be one in the same. So non-furries don’t want to be furries, furries don't want non-furries burdened with what we are and yet if we keep the definition as it stands we don’t really have a basis to argue otherwise.
Beyond semantics around the literal definition many people, myself included, feel that the definition is too light if simply unfitting for what we feel (as vague as that is) the community is. I for one believe the furry community goes deeper than simply an affiliation to a collection of similarly designed characters.
In my own mind we furries are a community that likes characters with animal traits that go as far as actually being animals in all ways aside from mind, ranging from a passing interest to a sexual fetish, and to the extent where most have our own fictionalized character that represents us. That is one hefty sentence, cobbled together from a myriad of ideas and even then if I look back on it I feel it is a grossly inaccurate statement. We are so much more than that, there is so much about us that is left undescribed and to anyone that encountered the community.
I don’t want to make this post any longer than it has to be, and so I shall call an end to it here, but if you have your own thoughts do please share them. I will go into other aspects of the community over the coming weeks, regardless of interest really. I want to get back into writing but I no longer feel in good consciousness that I can write the shitty smut I used to. Either way, this helps me write and allows me to escape my situation for a while.
