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rowynI was with with some friends recently, and the subject of "furs" came up. A couple of people there said they weren't furs. I said, "Well, I am."
Some weeks ago, Koogrr offered the following simple definition of "furry": "Animal People Are Beautiful." (I think those were his words.) This is an inclusive definition: if you think the idea of anthropomorphized animals is cool, then you're furry.
One of my friends told me I was too 'normal' to be a furry. My response was: 'For me, saying I'm not "furry" because I don't, I don't know, proclaim my sincere belief that I am a fox mistakenly incarnated as a human, is just as silly as for homosexual man to say he's not gay because he isn't a member of a gay activist organization. I play on a furry muck. I draw pictures of furry people. The book I'm writing now doesn't have any furries in it, but one I write in the future probably will.'
Another friend offered that he preferred the term 'anthro fan' because 'fur' had come to have the wrong connotations. Just as the 'Trekkies' are the obsessives of sf fandom, so have 'furries' and 'furs' become the obsessives of the anthro fandom.
That seems fair enough. In my example above, this is the equivalent of a homosexual refusing a particular label because that label implied 'person obsessed with his sexuality' rather than simply 'person attracted to members of the same gender.'
However, it also means conceding the label. It means admitting that an otherwise reasonable and descriptive term is off-limits because some people have narrowed the field of what it can be applied to. My friend offered that this is the outcome desired by those who embrace the label 'furry' most. The people who vehemently identify themselves as 'furry' don't consider mere afficionados, like me, a part of their world.
And this last is what I wonder about the most. Would the furries of the world rather disown me as too 'normal', as not 'furry' enough, because I don't identify with a totem animal or take to cuddling in large groups, or do whatever else it is that 'real furries' are supposed to do?
Am I furry?
Or is the English language as a whole aided, if I gracefully yield the term to those more devoted than myself, and turn, instead, to 'anthro fan'?
Some weeks ago, Koogrr offered the following simple definition of "furry": "Animal People Are Beautiful." (I think those were his words.) This is an inclusive definition: if you think the idea of anthropomorphized animals is cool, then you're furry.
One of my friends told me I was too 'normal' to be a furry. My response was: 'For me, saying I'm not "furry" because I don't, I don't know, proclaim my sincere belief that I am a fox mistakenly incarnated as a human, is just as silly as for homosexual man to say he's not gay because he isn't a member of a gay activist organization. I play on a furry muck. I draw pictures of furry people. The book I'm writing now doesn't have any furries in it, but one I write in the future probably will.'
Another friend offered that he preferred the term 'anthro fan' because 'fur' had come to have the wrong connotations. Just as the 'Trekkies' are the obsessives of sf fandom, so have 'furries' and 'furs' become the obsessives of the anthro fandom.
That seems fair enough. In my example above, this is the equivalent of a homosexual refusing a particular label because that label implied 'person obsessed with his sexuality' rather than simply 'person attracted to members of the same gender.'
However, it also means conceding the label. It means admitting that an otherwise reasonable and descriptive term is off-limits because some people have narrowed the field of what it can be applied to. My friend offered that this is the outcome desired by those who embrace the label 'furry' most. The people who vehemently identify themselves as 'furry' don't consider mere afficionados, like me, a part of their world.
And this last is what I wonder about the most. Would the furries of the world rather disown me as too 'normal', as not 'furry' enough, because I don't identify with a totem animal or take to cuddling in large groups, or do whatever else it is that 'real furries' are supposed to do?
Am I furry?
Or is the English language as a whole aided, if I gracefully yield the term to those more devoted than myself, and turn, instead, to 'anthro fan'?
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I think....
Date: 2002-10-04 08:34 pm (UTC)Immo, most of them have adopted furriness as a way of expressing alienation from the world. they don't want to be thought of to be like anyone except this band of people who are supposed to subscribe to the theory that everyone in it likes everyone else in it.
Many of them have other related issues and are using the sense of "not being themselves" to work on them, rather than really thinking too deeply about animal archtypes and such. I mean, darned near EVERY one of them insists their morphs have lips, and there is almost no reason to think this would be case for "real" anthro'd animals.
I admit, if I sound a little critical, it's because I used to resemble this remark. Now I don't need a communal focus to condone my alienation though :)
Re: I think....
Date: 2002-10-04 08:53 pm (UTC)I don't understand the need to distance oneself from the word "furry" other than those people who want to distance themselves from others they find to be objectionable (usually based on sexual interests, and these people do not make up a majority of the fandom anyway).
Even saying "anthropomorphics fan" is too ungainly to catch on, although a few antifurry diehards maintain that term. I think saying "furry" is much simpler even if it covers a wider variety of peoples.
Trickster
Re: I think....
Date: 2002-10-05 07:42 am (UTC)I don't know. Maybe the 'fox trapped in a man's body,' and the people for whom anthro activities are their only hobby need, and deserve, their own word. And perhaps that word should be 'furry'.
Certainly to say that "most" of the people who show an appreciation for anthropomophized animals do so out of a sense of alienation would be an exaggeration. Perhaps "most of those who become obsessed with anthro animals do so out of a sense of alienation" would be apt.