I had some skepticism that this piece would be worthy of Reality's Last Stand when I read the first few sentences. However, I gave it a fair chance and kept reading. I found this to be well thought out, coherent, well presented, appropriate in how it introduced the Furry community to the reader, and well balanced in not overly delving into lurid or detailed descriptions of the Furry community. I will add more in a separate comment so that if people want to like what is in this comment (but not the other) they can do so.
I think the lack of detail and keeping things high level was important for a few reasons. It allows people who don't relate to the Furry community to understand the issue without getting bogged down in some unhelpful dissociation. It also makes the article easier to focus on the issues (percentage of space). Further, it allows this article to be more easily applied to other communities with less confusion or argument.
I think that this article adds value to societal discussion and awareness of how radicalization and negative social behaviors can develop in a community that starts as innocuous and which at its core beliefs starts as innocuous (at least, relative to what we are talking about).
I found this constructive. But it still did not provide an answer to the question that immediately popped into my mind: “why not Trekkies as well?” The fandom subgroup seems very similar in many ways. But where is the radicalization and darkness? Why Furries and not Trekkies? And yes, I am being serious.
I *thought* that’s where I would find the explanation. But I didn’t; perhaps I am just obtuse. I get that there is a “different dynamic.” But that just begs the question. Still unanswered is why? Trekkies have been mocked endlessly for decades. Many have strong identifications, defensiveness, even “Treksonas.” Yet, for some reason, this jump to radicalization does not materialize. What is it about the fursona that makes it more amenable, less resistant?
Your explanations about some of the positive attractors of furryness—creativity, whimsy, etc.—make perfect sense. I suspect there might be plenty of Venn diagram overlap with Trekkies. I have no idea of what the LGBTQ component of Trekkies might be, but I bet it’s more than zero. Is there a different psychology at work or group mechanism? Ethan suggests it might be stigma. Maybe so. Perhaps Trekkies are merely “lightly ridiculed,” while Furries are truly stigmatized and outcast (despite their growing economic impact).
I will have to think on that. Thanks for the good question.
Trekkies have hit the mainstream, shows like Young Justice and The Big Bang Theory have had Trekkie and Star Wars fans as elements plot elements. Young Justice had Beast Boy on a show based off Star Trek. The Big Bang Theory played it for humor, yes, but in a way that clearly indicated that the producers were also Trekkies and they were giving it an air of legitimacy.
If the nerds on Big Bang were furries it would be framed differently because this fandom confuses people. I am planning a series on how the media has created an aversion for normal society to try to understand us and for furries themselves to be open to discussion. They will HATE that I talked.
Thank you for your article and for sharing it here, I really appreciate it.
There was a time when groups that had established their own rules and norms would remain in their own defied spaces or clubs. They did not expect society in general to understand them, the in-group was the audience, and could balance any outside lack of understanding or stigma.
Now everything is made public, and you are asking for general public understanding at a time when other identity groups - or the activists advocating for them - have poisoned the waters for everyone by, on the one hand setting up a false dichotomy between total acceptance with full social concessions or total "erasure" of identity, and on the other hand trying to change minds by force and cancellation rather than persuasion (as is a theme of this site).
Worse, some of your members apparently have put their entire identity on the line, and are responding to negative feed-back with the same level of desperation as members of other identity or ideology groups.
By going public a group exposes itself to a world that is not an in-group safe space, the least so on-line. So I hope you can sort things out and take it in stride that, while some will show genuine interest, other indifference, yet others will have things to say about your life style or identity choice. It really is something else, but you are helpful to anyone wanting some insight.
That's really all I can be. There is a saying, don't be so open minded your brain falls out. I also believe that being closed minded is as bad. I am advocating for this, don't be so accepting that your society falls out, however, don't think this is untenable. I hate how poisoned the word "coexist" has become but that is what my ideal is. There is no future in my fandom with extreme Marxist and Anarchist radicals. There is no future with transtrenders and queer culture. I am asking the public to keep us on a lenient leash (Pun not intended), but pull us back when we become a threat. In order to achieve this I am going to have to profile quite a bit and cover a great deal of unseemly subjects. I am done with the fandom's own self-policing.
Wow, this piece was informative. Thanks to the author for his/her bravery. I nonetheless believe that the furry community or fandom is full of pathologies. It is positive that individuals with social isolation, many with personality disorders and/or autism have a community. However, when the fandom supports a fundamental change in identity and the community develops paranoia as they are clearly abnormal, that is, not within the broad boundaries of normal social behaviors. Now it has been infected by, if not corrupted by violent ideologies with plenty of positive reinforcement, the society at large needs to be informed and be prepared to take action. I am not sure what us normals need to do but many of its adherents have crossed the line.
I think the article could have been 1/10th the length. I skimmed it, because it’s not that interesting. What’s interesting is how many shooters have come from this tiny community. Similar to the disproportionate number of mass shooters from the trans community.
It is not like a cult. A cult is an organized framework. This is a grassroots community or whatever you want to call it. If anything, a cult would actually be resistant to the behaviors being discussed because if cult leaders were against the new behaviors those people would get kicked out. Of course they could then start a new cult that included such behaviors in the beliefs and practices, but then it would not be radical infiltration of an existing community.
It's odd what was left out of this piece, especially given the context of the "violence problem" -- the fandom skews very heavily male and always has. Earliest studies (2011) that asked only whether people were male or female got 80-83% male. 2021-2022 studies that used a "forced-choice" format that separates [cis] man and woman from non-cis identities got: Cis Man 60.9–62.8%, Cis Woman5.6–10.7%, Trans Woman 2.5–5.6%, Trans Man3.5–3.6%, Genderqueer12.6–18.5%, Other4.2–7.9% (From 2023 Furscience: A Decade of Psychological Research on the Furry Fandom, edited by Plante, Reysen, Adams, Roberts, and Gerbasi.)
I am friends of people in quite diverse sexual communities, though I am not of them, and what you wrote is quite true for an enormous number of people who enjoy activities often best left unscrutinized.
The magazine/softback “Re/Search” has revealed many many of these communities, and was ahead of its time in the 80’s.
Life has created the need to perform many public functions without personal scrutiny, and Internet facilitates that enormously.
Yet, things fester in darkness as you know. The dissolution of boundaries between fantasy and reality are the beginning of the end.
I had some skepticism that this piece would be worthy of Reality's Last Stand when I read the first few sentences. However, I gave it a fair chance and kept reading. I found this to be well thought out, coherent, well presented, appropriate in how it introduced the Furry community to the reader, and well balanced in not overly delving into lurid or detailed descriptions of the Furry community. I will add more in a separate comment so that if people want to like what is in this comment (but not the other) they can do so.
I think the lack of detail and keeping things high level was important for a few reasons. It allows people who don't relate to the Furry community to understand the issue without getting bogged down in some unhelpful dissociation. It also makes the article easier to focus on the issues (percentage of space). Further, it allows this article to be more easily applied to other communities with less confusion or argument.
I think that this article adds value to societal discussion and awareness of how radicalization and negative social behaviors can develop in a community that starts as innocuous and which at its core beliefs starts as innocuous (at least, relative to what we are talking about).
But after we get “gender affirming care” outlawed in every state, can we still spay furries? Seriously, this was an informative article!
Very interesting overview of a seemingly immature and certainly not well understood social phenomena.
At first it brought to mind treckies or comicon fandom.
But with the addition of pornography it was no longer benign.
And quickly pushed it over to the dark side.
I have 2 OC's from highschool.
I found this constructive. But it still did not provide an answer to the question that immediately popped into my mind: “why not Trekkies as well?” The fandom subgroup seems very similar in many ways. But where is the radicalization and darkness? Why Furries and not Trekkies? And yes, I am being serious.
I covered that in my article about identity. There is a different dynamic at play, radically different. Thank you for reading by the way.
I *thought* that’s where I would find the explanation. But I didn’t; perhaps I am just obtuse. I get that there is a “different dynamic.” But that just begs the question. Still unanswered is why? Trekkies have been mocked endlessly for decades. Many have strong identifications, defensiveness, even “Treksonas.” Yet, for some reason, this jump to radicalization does not materialize. What is it about the fursona that makes it more amenable, less resistant?
Your explanations about some of the positive attractors of furryness—creativity, whimsy, etc.—make perfect sense. I suspect there might be plenty of Venn diagram overlap with Trekkies. I have no idea of what the LGBTQ component of Trekkies might be, but I bet it’s more than zero. Is there a different psychology at work or group mechanism? Ethan suggests it might be stigma. Maybe so. Perhaps Trekkies are merely “lightly ridiculed,” while Furries are truly stigmatized and outcast (despite their growing economic impact).
I will have to think on that. Thanks for the good question.
Trekkies have hit the mainstream, shows like Young Justice and The Big Bang Theory have had Trekkie and Star Wars fans as elements plot elements. Young Justice had Beast Boy on a show based off Star Trek. The Big Bang Theory played it for humor, yes, but in a way that clearly indicated that the producers were also Trekkies and they were giving it an air of legitimacy.
If the nerds on Big Bang were furries it would be framed differently because this fandom confuses people. I am planning a series on how the media has created an aversion for normal society to try to understand us and for furries themselves to be open to discussion. They will HATE that I talked.
Call it what it is: demonization
Absolutely.
Thank you for your article and for sharing it here, I really appreciate it.
There was a time when groups that had established their own rules and norms would remain in their own defied spaces or clubs. They did not expect society in general to understand them, the in-group was the audience, and could balance any outside lack of understanding or stigma.
Now everything is made public, and you are asking for general public understanding at a time when other identity groups - or the activists advocating for them - have poisoned the waters for everyone by, on the one hand setting up a false dichotomy between total acceptance with full social concessions or total "erasure" of identity, and on the other hand trying to change minds by force and cancellation rather than persuasion (as is a theme of this site).
Worse, some of your members apparently have put their entire identity on the line, and are responding to negative feed-back with the same level of desperation as members of other identity or ideology groups.
By going public a group exposes itself to a world that is not an in-group safe space, the least so on-line. So I hope you can sort things out and take it in stride that, while some will show genuine interest, other indifference, yet others will have things to say about your life style or identity choice. It really is something else, but you are helpful to anyone wanting some insight.
That's really all I can be. There is a saying, don't be so open minded your brain falls out. I also believe that being closed minded is as bad. I am advocating for this, don't be so accepting that your society falls out, however, don't think this is untenable. I hate how poisoned the word "coexist" has become but that is what my ideal is. There is no future in my fandom with extreme Marxist and Anarchist radicals. There is no future with transtrenders and queer culture. I am asking the public to keep us on a lenient leash (Pun not intended), but pull us back when we become a threat. In order to achieve this I am going to have to profile quite a bit and cover a great deal of unseemly subjects. I am done with the fandom's own self-policing.
Stigmatization, my guess. Trekkies don't have elaborate lies made about them to fear monger a political agenda.
As I said above, I wrote about this in the article about identity on my personal Substack. Thank you for reading!
Wow, this piece was informative. Thanks to the author for his/her bravery. I nonetheless believe that the furry community or fandom is full of pathologies. It is positive that individuals with social isolation, many with personality disorders and/or autism have a community. However, when the fandom supports a fundamental change in identity and the community develops paranoia as they are clearly abnormal, that is, not within the broad boundaries of normal social behaviors. Now it has been infected by, if not corrupted by violent ideologies with plenty of positive reinforcement, the society at large needs to be informed and be prepared to take action. I am not sure what us normals need to do but many of its adherents have crossed the line.
Sounds like a cult.
I think the article could have been 1/10th the length. I skimmed it, because it’s not that interesting. What’s interesting is how many shooters have come from this tiny community. Similar to the disproportionate number of mass shooters from the trans community.
It is not like a cult. A cult is an organized framework. This is a grassroots community or whatever you want to call it. If anything, a cult would actually be resistant to the behaviors being discussed because if cult leaders were against the new behaviors those people would get kicked out. Of course they could then start a new cult that included such behaviors in the beliefs and practices, but then it would not be radical infiltration of an existing community.
It's odd what was left out of this piece, especially given the context of the "violence problem" -- the fandom skews very heavily male and always has. Earliest studies (2011) that asked only whether people were male or female got 80-83% male. 2021-2022 studies that used a "forced-choice" format that separates [cis] man and woman from non-cis identities got: Cis Man 60.9–62.8%, Cis Woman5.6–10.7%, Trans Woman 2.5–5.6%, Trans Man3.5–3.6%, Genderqueer12.6–18.5%, Other4.2–7.9% (From 2023 Furscience: A Decade of Psychological Research on the Furry Fandom, edited by Plante, Reysen, Adams, Roberts, and Gerbasi.)
I should have mentioned that. I will try to write an article about that in the future.
Well done frankly. Kudos.
I am friends of people in quite diverse sexual communities, though I am not of them, and what you wrote is quite true for an enormous number of people who enjoy activities often best left unscrutinized.
The magazine/softback “Re/Search” has revealed many many of these communities, and was ahead of its time in the 80’s.
Life has created the need to perform many public functions without personal scrutiny, and Internet facilitates that enormously.
Yet, things fester in darkness as you know. The dissolution of boundaries between fantasy and reality are the beginning of the end.
Glad you are not there.